Pumpkin Pie

My first Thanksgiving away from home was my junior year of college. Going to school in northern California meant that I was an 8 hour drive away from home; I had no desire to make the long trek down the 5, and being a broke college kid meant I couldn't afford holiday airfare home. Much to my parents chagrin, I decided to stay in the Bay Area and drive down to Santa Cruz for Thanksgiving dinner with a high school friend who was attending UCSC.

I made a few pumpkin pies, packed up my car, and headed off to Santa Crux aftr dropping off some friends in San Jose. Everyone was worried about me though, since my car wasn't the most reliable--in fact, it had a penchant for breaking down at the worst possible moment. And of course, why would Thanksgiving be any different. Alone on a windy, two-lane road in the Santa Cruz Mountains, halfway between San Jose and Santa Cruz, my car puttered and jerked to a halt right at a bend in the road. There was no getting it started again, so I pulled out my cell and made some calls...a short while later, AAA was there to give me a lift back to my friend's house in San Jose, the pies still sitting in the back seat.

Though sitting on that mountain road was pretty scary, that turned out to be a great Thanksgiving. We never did eat the pies though, as my hosts already had a full spread prepared. But every year I make the same recipe and laugh when I think about that first Thanksgiving away from home.

This pie is a family favorite; it's bold, spicy flavor puts store-bought--and even the Libby's pumpkin recipe--to shame. I use canned pumpkin, but you can also roast your own pumpkins for the puree.

Ingredients
1 ½ cup pumpkin puree
2 beaten eggs
½ teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon each ground mace and cloves (sub nutmeg for mace if you don't have any mace)
¾ cup brown sugar
½ cup evaporated milk
½ teaspoon each salt, ginger and nutmeg
9” pie shell (I use Martha Stewart's pate brisee recipe)

Directions

Pre-heat oven to 450 degrees. Press pie dough into greased 9" pie pan.

In a large bowl, mix ingredients together in the order given. Pour into unbaked pie shell and bake at 450 degrees for 15 minutes.

Reduce heat to 350 degrees and bake another 45 minutes.

Cool before serving. Garnish with whipped cream, if desired.

Pumpkin Custard

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving--are you ready?! The husband and I are hosting Thanksgiving for the second time this year and I've been planning the menu since about September. My original menu had about 3 sides and 15 desserts, but I've since changed it up a bit and reduced the amount of desserts to just three. Believe me, I'd much rather eat dessert for dinner than "real" food, but I know I'm kind of alone on this one, and since I shouldn't be eating too many sweets, I figured I shouldn't create a bunch of leftover treats either. Boo.

Even though I plan to indulge on Thanksgiving, I do want to have a "less guilt" dessert option, so I don't completely jump off the South Beach train. These pumpkin custards are a nice option for people following South Beach or who are just watching their sugar intake. I tweaked the recipe a bit to include more spices, as the original only called for a little nutmeg and cinnamon; I like my pumpkin to have a bolder flavor.


Pumpkin Custard
Source: Adapted from Reverse Diabetes: Holiday Recipes
Printable Recipe

Ingredients
2 large eggs
2 egg whites
1/2 cup sugar
1 Tablespoon agave syrup
3/4 cup pumpkin puree
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon all spice
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups low fat milk

whipped cream, for topping

Directions
Preheat your oven to 325 degrees. Line a roasting pan with a kitchen towel to prevent the custard cups from sliding around. Bring a large pot of water to boil.

In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, egg whites, sugar and agave until smooth. Add the pumpkin puree, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, all spice, salt, and vanilla. Whisk until blended; whisk in the milk.

Pour the mixture into six 6 ounce (3/4 cup) ramekins. Set the custard cups on top of the towel in the pan and slowly pour the boiling water into the pan, until it reaches about halfway up the sides of the cups.

Gently place the roasting pan in the oven and bake for 50-55 minutes, until the custards are set.
Remove the roasting pan from the oven and place the ramekins on a wire rack to cool.

Refrigerate for at least an hour, or until completely cooled. Serve with whipped cream if desired,

Pumpkin Pie Bars

Well, it's almost Thanksgiving, so hopefully you have your menu for this year's turkey dinner planned out. But, if you're still looking for another addition to the dessert table here's a fun spin on pumpkin pie! These bars have the soft consistency of traditional pumpkin pie and the butterscotch chips add an element of flavor that pairs so well with the pumpkin.

Pumpkin Pie Bars
Source: Annie's Eats and Joy the Baker
Printable Recipe

Crust and Topping Ingredients
1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
¼ cup granulated sugar
½ cup brown sugar, firmly packed
12 Tablespoon cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 cup old-fashioned oats
½ cup chopped pecans
Butterscotch chips, for topping (use as many as you like)

Filling Ingredients
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
½ cup sugar
3 large eggs
1 (15 oz.) can pumpkin puree (about 1 3/4 cup)
1 Tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Line a 9×13-inch baking pan with foil,folding the foil over the edges of the pan. Lightly grease the foil.

Combine the flour, granulated sugar and brown sugar in a small mixing bowl and mix with a fork. Add the pieces of butter to the dry ingredients and cut it in with a pastry blender until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs (you can also do this in a food processor or with a fork). Stir in the oats and chopped pecans.

Reserve 1 cup of the crust mixture and set aside. Add the remaining crust mixture to the prepared baking pan and press onto the bottom of the pan in an even layer.

Bake the crust alone in the oven for 15 minutes. In the meantime, prepare the filling.

To make the filling, combine the cream cheese, sugar, eggs, pumpkin puree, pumpkin pie spice and vanilla in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium speed until smooth and well combined.

Once the crust has been removed from the oven, pour the filling into the pan and smooth over the crust. Sprinkle the filling with the reserved crumb mixture and butterscotch chips.

Bake for 25 minutes, remove from the oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool. Slice and serve.

Homemade Pumpkin Puree

A few weeks ago I was earnestly awaiting fall. Never mind the 100+ degree temperatures we were still experiencing; I wanted to taste fall! The best way to satisfy a fall craving is with pumpkin treats, so I set out to the grocery store to pick up a can or too of pumpkin puree. Of course, the shelves were bare. Two years in a row of poor pumpkin crops led to two years of a pumpkin shortage. Even suppliers online were estimating shipping times upwards of 2 months!

Just as I was thinking about roasting pumpkins for my own pumpkin puree, Annie of Annie's Eats posted a tutorial on that very topic, taking all the guesswork out of it for me! By the time I got around to picking up some pie pumpkins, canned pumpkin puree was back on the shelves. However, I fancy myself a hippie of sorts, so I still wanted to give homemade pumpkin puree a try. Super easy, though a bit messy. If anyone out there has a baby, I bet this would make for some great homemade baby food too.

You can freeze your homemade pumpkin and save for the next time you're craving a homemade pumpkin treat. I used mine to make pumpkin cream cheese muffins....yum!



Homemade Pumpkin Puree
Source: Annie's Eats
Printable Recipe




Ingredients
Pie pumpkins
water

Directions
Pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees.

Using a sharp knife on a stable surface, slice each pumpkin in half lengthwise. I found their shells to be very hard, so be careful!

Scoop out all the pumpkin "guts" and seeds. Set aside if you want to make roasted pumpkin seeds, otherwise discard.

Place the pumpkin halves face down on a cookie sheet (be sure to use one with raised sides). Pour water onto the cookie sheet until it's about an inch or so deep. This will help steam the pumpkin flesh.

Bake the pumpkins for about 60-90 minutes, or until a fork can easily pierce through the shell. Let cool.

Drain the water off of the cookie sheet and discard. Scoop the roasted flesh out of the shells and into a food processor. Process until it is a smooth puree.

Line a mesh strainer with paper towels and set over a medium bowl. Scoop the pumpkin puree into the strainer and let sit for about an hour. This allows the excess liquid to drain out of the puree. Discard the liquid and store your pumpkin puree in a freezer-safe container. Freeze if you are not going to use in the next few days.
Note: I got about about 3 cups of pumpkin puree from two pie pumpkins.

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins

It's fall, which in the baking world, means time for pumpkin. I am not a huge Stabucks fan; I pretty much only order their black iced tea (no sweetener) or in the winter, their caramel apple cider. But I do love the pumpkin cream cheese muffins they bring out every fall. The big dollop of cream cheese in the middle is such a great contrast to the moist pumpkin. But at nearly $2 a pop, I can't afford to indulge in these treats very often, so I scoured the internet looking for a knock-off recipe. Ok, I didn't scour the internet; I pretty much just used the first recipe I found. But these muffins came out even better than the Starbucks original. They are dense, moist, spicy, and the cream cheese is perfect. I couldn't find any pumpkin seeds at my grocery store, so I omitted them, but if I had found them, I think I would have toasted them in butter and brown sugar.

These muffins taste even better a day or two after making them. The spicyness of the various spices really kicks in, giving these muffins a more pronounced tasted. That came out weird...they just taste better after a few days. I took a platter of these muffins to work and they were completely gone within an hour. I think that's a pretty good indicator of how great they really are!

The original recipe called for 1 1/4 cups of vegatable oil. I replaced the entire amount of oil with applesauce to cut down on some fat and calories. I also used neufchatel cheese instead of cream cheese; the grocery store worker told me they were interchangeable, with neufchatel cheese containing less fat than regular cream cheese. I didn't notice any difference in flavor. Also, the original recipe called for 2 cups white sugar, but I decided to use half white and half brown, just to change things up a bit.



Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins
Adapted from Musings of a Mommy
Printable Recipe

Ingredients
For the muffins:
3 cups flour
1 heaping teaspoon cinnamon
1 heaping teaspoon nutmeg
1 heaping teaspoon ground cloves
4 1/2 heaping teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
4 eggs
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 cups canned pumpkin puree
1 1/4 cups unsweetened applesauce

For the cream cheese filling:
8 ounce package cream cheese (or neufchatel cheese), softened
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon brown sugar



Directions:
Pre-heat your oven to 35o degrees.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the first 7 ingredients for the muffins. Mix together until just combined.

In a seperate bowl, beat the eggs and mix in the sugars.

Add the egg and sugar mixture to the dry ingredients. Add in the pumpkin puree and applesauce, and mix until well combined.

Spoon into greased muffin tins. Set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine the cream cheese, vanilla, powdered sugar, and brown sugar. Mix until well combined.

Spoon into a sandwich bag sized ziploc. Cut off the tip of one corner. Pipe the cream cheese into the muffin batter, pushing it down into the batter slightly.

Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the muffin (avoid the cream cheese) comes out clean. Let cook 5-10 minutes before serving.

Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream

My husband is the best at gift giving. Ever since we met he has always put a ton of thought and care into purchasing me gifts. A few months into dating he surprised me with a pair of pink Converse just because he knew I liked them. Christmas and birthdays are no different; I always get the best gifts. Not that presents are what makes a relationship, but it is nice to be married to someone who knows exactly what I want.

This year my birthday was no exception. I talked about buying the ice cream attachment for my Kitchen Aid mixer all summer, but was hesitant to spend that much money. So of course, I received the coveted attachment for a birthday gift last week!

I wanted to try a simple, yet seemingly fancy flavor for my first attempt. Luckily my KA attachment came with several recipes, including this one for pumpkin pie ice cream. A perfect match of fall flavors and the 90+ degree southern California weather!

Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream
Source: Adapted from Kitchen Aid
Printable Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups light cream (My store didn't have this, so I just used whole milk. You can also sub 1/2 and 1/2)
  
• 6 egg yolks
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (I used 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon and 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg)
• 1 1/2 cups heavy cream (Again, my store didn't have this, so I used heavy whipping cream)
  
• 1 1/2 cups canned pumpkin puree
• 2 teaspoons brown sugar (my addition)
  

Directions
(Make sure to freeze your freezer bowl at least 15 hours in advance)

Scald the light cream in a heavy saucepan. In a medium bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, white sugar, and vanilla.

Gradually whisk the cream into the yolk mixture. Add in the spice.

Return the entire mixture to the saucepan and stir over medium-low heat until the mixture thickens; about 10 minutes. Do not allow to boil. Remove from heat.

Whisk in the heavy cream, pumpkin, and brown sugar.

Cover and refrigerate until well chilled (over night is best).

Assemble the freezer bowl attachment and turn the mixer on to ONE. Pour the chilled ice cream batter into the bowl and continue to stir on ONE for 15-20 minutes, or until it is the desired consistency.

Serve immediately, sprinkled with nutmeg, or freeze.

Makes about 8 one cup servings.