Easy Pumpkin Bar Recipe

Here's an easy recipe if you have an extra can of pumpkin sitting around. I posted recipes last Thanksgiving, so maybe this will become an annual tradition. This recipe actually came in a flyer from a local bank, so not all junk mail is bad!

Ingredients
2 cups all-purpose flour
1-1/2 cups packed brown sugar (I used slightly less, I admit)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice*
 1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup apple juice (I didn't have any, so I substituted apricot nectar - hey, it was in my pantry!)
1 can (15 oz.) pumpkin (not the pre-seasoned pumpkin pie mix)
2 eggs

*NOTE: If you don't have 2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice, you can substitute 1 tsp. cinnamon, 1/2 tsp. ginger, 1/4 tsp. nutmeg, 1/4 tsp. cloves.

Directions:
Heat oven to 350°F. Grease & flour a 15x10x1-inch pan. (As you can see from the photo below, I didn't have that size pan, so I improvised.)

In a large bowl, beat all the ingredients together with an electric mixer until combined. (The original recipe said "on low speed until moistened. Beat 2 minutes on medium speed," but who has the patience for that?) Spread batter in pan.

Bake 20-30 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely (about 1 hour). I admit that I didn't wait that long before tasting.

Finishing touches - The original recipe suggested using a 16-oz. container of ready-made cream cheese frosting to be applied after the pumpkin bar has cooled for an hour. Then it said you should refrigerate the whole thing for another 30 minutes "until set." Honestly, who can wait for that!? Assuming you have leftovers, you should store them in the fridge.

I'm not a big frosting fan, and I found it fine without topping. I did briefly consider spreading pecan pumpkin butter on it, but decided that was overkill! Happy Thanksgiving!

Got Tomatoes? - A Summer Recipe

This summer I actually have ripe tomatoes! In the past (when I've bothered to plant anything), I tend to start too late in the growing season, which in Wisconsin is pretty short anyway, and I end up salvaging green tomatoes off the vine when the first freeze comes. This year I actually had to worry about using up my tomatoes before they got TOO ripe!

So I tried the recipe for Bread and Tomato Salad from the Sundays At Moosewood cookbook.

INGREDIENTS:
2 cups dried bread cubes (about 1/2" cubes)
2 garlic cloves minced
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 cups chopped tomatoes
1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
salt & pepper to taste

In a large skillet, saute bread cubes and garlic in olive oil until garlic starts to color and bread has absorbed most of the olive oil. Put the bread in a large dish and add remaining ingredients and mix. The bread does get pretty soggy, and toasting helped somewhat before sauteing. (I admit to eating this with my fingers ;o)

Be sure to check the comments on this post for more tomato recipes! :D

Simple Sweet Scones

Long ago in the days before the internet (the 1980s), I was struggling with a scone recipe from British Heritage magazine (I think the measurements were by weight rather than volume), and my college housemates took pity on me and bought me Biscuits and Scones by Elizabeth Alston.

Twenty years later, the spine of the book has cracked so that it will usually just flop open to the recipe for Simple Sweet Scones.

2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut up
1/4 cup granulated sugar (or 1/3 cup for sweeter scones)
2/3 cup milk

Preheat oven to 425F. Mix flour, baking powder and salt together in a large bowl. Add the butter and cut in with a pastry blender or rub it in with your fingers until the mixture looks like fine granules. (I prefer the finger method.) Add sugar; toss to mix (with your hands - not tossing it up into the air ;o).

Add milk and stir with a fork until a soft dough forms. Form the dough into a ball, and knead gently on a lightly floured board (about 10-12 kneads). Pat or roll the dough out into a circle about 1" thick and cut out scones with a biscuit cutter or round drinking glass dipped in flour.

Place scones on an ungreased cookie sheet, and bake for about 12 minutes or until medium brown on top. Put a linen or cotton dish towel on a wire rack and lay scones out to cool, covering them loosely with the cloth. Serve with butter & jam (or whipped cream or clotted cream if you're feeling decadent), and a nice cuppa tea.

What I'm Baking

Happy Thanksgiving! So where did November go? Beats the heck out of me! I thought I'd share the recipes for the two desserts I made this week:

Wisconsin Whoppers
These are giant oatmeal-peanut butter-chocolate chip-cranberry cookies.

2/3 cup (1-1/3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1-1/4 cups packed light brown sugar (I usually reduce this to 1 cup)
3/4 cup white (granulated) sugar
3 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1-1/2 cups peanut butter
6 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
2 teaspoons baking soda
1-1/2 cups dried cranberries (6 oz. package of Craisins)
about 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips (I don't really measure this!)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

With mixer, cream butter in a large bowl until light-colored, about 1 minute. Gradually beat in sugars then scrape down sides of bowl. Cream until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. (OK, I really don't beat it quite as long as the recipe says because I'm impatient.)

Beat in eggs, one at a time; beat 1 minute more after final addition. Add vanilla extract and peanut butter and beat until blended, 1 minute. Add oats and baking soda, beating only until blended, about 30 seconds. If you don't have a heavy duty Kitchen Aid and are just using a wimpy handmixer like I do, switch to a sturdy spoon after adding the oats and stir until the oats have all been coated with peanut butter.

Stir cranberries and chocolate chips into creamed mixture until evenly distributed.

For "whopper" size cookies, use 1/4 cup measure to spoon out dough onto cookie sheets. Flatten cookies to 3-inches in diameter with bottom of a glass tumbler that is dipped frequently in water. (Or just use your hands!) Or just spoon out whatever size cookies you usually make. Space cookies about 2 inches apart.

Bake 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Let cool about five minutes on baking sheet before moving to wire rack. (They are very crumbly when they first come out of the oven.)

Makes 2 to 4 dozen depending on size.

Original source: Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (A copy of their version, which is slightly different, can be found here) Did you know that Wisconsin is the top cranberry-producing state?
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Zesty Orange Pumpkin Tart
Easy peasy pumpkin pie! (Another recipe from the Journal-Sentinel)

You'll need a ready-made unbaked pie crust for a one-crust pie in a 9 or 10" pie pan (unless you're one of those masochists who likes to make your own pastry ;o)
Pie Filling:
1 can (16 oz.) solid-pack pumpkin (not the already seasoned pie filling)
1 can (12 oz.) evaporated milk
1/2 cup white sugar
1/3 cup orange marmalade
2 eggs
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (see note below)
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

In a large mixing bowl combine all the filling ingredients and blend until smooth. (Orange peel in the marmalade will cling to your mixer blades! :o) Pour into your pie-crust lined pan. Bake for 40 to 50 minutes or until a knife inserted in the center of the filling comes out clean. Let cool before serving. Serve with REAL whipped cream. None of that non-dairy whipped topping stuff!

Notes: If you don't have 1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice on hand, you can substitute 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon, 1/4 tsp. ground ginger, 1/4 tsp. ground allspice, 1/8 tsp. ground nutmeg.

I recommend using a pie crust shield to protect the edges of your crust from burning. I usually put it on about 15 minutes into baking. Otherwise you can use strips of aluminum foil, which are a BIG pain!

Have a great holiday weekend!

Pancake Tuesday!

Since I'm not particularly religious, I don't generally even know when Easter is, much less Lent, but yesterday my husband (who has even less Sunday schooling than I do) and I were discussing the fact that it must be coming up soon, because all the local restaurants have started advertising a fish fry for Lent, even the ones that don't normally have one (like the Mexican and Chinese places). So yes, lo and behold, today is Shrove Tuesday aka Fat Tuesday aka Mardi Gras aka use up all the things you're supposed to give up for Lent by making pancakes. (So that's why IHOP is having free pancakes today! Duh!)

So here's a link to my post from last year featuring my husband's grandmother's chicken-killing pancake recipe!

I think we're having pancakes for dinner....

Strawberry Fields Forever

We don't have much of a strawberry patch, especially since I let the weeds take over both this spring and last, but I harvested just enough strawberries in June to make the following recipes at least once.

Venetian Strawberries
(a recipe from my friend Laura B)
1 pint strawberries
3 tablespoons brown sugar
3 tablespoons red wine vinegar

- halve strawberries
- add sugar and toss to coat
- let stand, mixing until moisture of berries melts the sugar
- stir in vinegar and toss to coat

Glazed Strawberry and/or Peach Pie
(a recipe from my mom - this is my version)
I didn't have enough strawberries so I threw in a can of sliced peaches (drained)

6 cups sliced strawberries or peaches
3/4 cup white sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup orange juice
1 baked 9-inch pie shell (I use Pillsbury pie crust - don't tell my mom!)

Mash enough sliced strawberries or peaches to fill 1 cup. Reserve remaining fruit.

Combine sugar, corn starch and cinnamon in small saucepan. Stir in the orange juice and mashed fruit. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture comes to a boil. Boil, stirring constantly, for one minute. This will thicken into a glaze.

Spread half of this glaze mixture over the bottom and sides of the baked pie crust. Fill will the reserved fruit. Pour the remaining glaze over the fruit, spreading to cover completely. Chill at least 3 hours. Serve with whipped cream or ice cream.

Grandma's Chicken-Killing Pancakes

First I should clarify that this recipe was from my husband's paternal grandmother, whom I never had the chance to meet. At her funeral, family members shared stories about her and handed out this pancake recipe with that title. Apparently one day, she threw some leftover pancakes out for the chickens, and one choked on a piece and died!

I used to make Bisquick pancakes, but now I only do these. I usually do half the recipe, which makes about six large. If I don't have buttermilk on hand, I substitute milk and lemon juice. (Add 1 tablespoon lemon juice to measuring cup, then fill with milk to make one cup liquid.)

Grandma P's Chicken-Killing Pancakes
Mix together:
2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt (I usually cut back a little)
2 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. sugar
2 eggs
2 cups buttermilk

Pour on hot griddle and serve with syrup. (Gotta have real maple syrup too!)

Snow snow snow

About 2:30 p.m. with snow still falling
Originally uploaded by vintagepix

Looks like we got over a foot of snow, but it's hard to tell with the drifts! Glen got his car shoveled out and I'll have to finish shoveling mine out of the garage tomorrow. Fun, fun!

This was our driveway around 2:30 p.m. when he shoveled a path to the mailbox and decided it was too mucky to continue.

For winter comfort food, I made my version of Yellowman's Banana Lime Bread from Sundays at Moosewood:

3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup butter
2 eggs
1 cup mashed ripe bananas (about 3)
3 tablespoons milk
1 tablespoon lime juice
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
3/4 cup grated coconut
2 cups white flour
1 teaspoon baking powder

Preheat oven to 350F and spray a 9 x 5 x 3-inch loaf pan with non-stick cooking spray (if it's not already non-stick :o). In a large mixing bowl, cream the sugar and butter. Stir in the egg, bananas, milk, and lime juice. Add the salt, ginger, and coconut and mix well. Measure the flour and baking powder into a separate bowl. Sift the dry ingredients into the wet and mix until smooth. Scrape the batter into the prepared loaf pan and bake for one hour, or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool the bread for about 10 minutes before removing from the pan. (There's a rum glaze that goes with this, but I'm too lazy to make it, and this is sweet and moist enough without it.)