TWD: Caramel Pumpkin Pie

Just like most food bloggers in Fall, I have the pumpkin bug. I tried to tell myself that I'd hold off until the weather felt more like Fall, but let's face it, in New Orleans that might not happen until late November! So I was delighted when I saw that Janell of Mortensen Family Memoirs had chosen Caramel Pumpkin Pie for this week's Tuesdays with Dorie recipe! Of course, when I went to the store to buy the pumpkin puree I had to pick up a few extra cans and even though I didn't snap any pictures I ended up making these delicious Pumpkin Scones from Bridget of The Way the Cookie Crumbles (they are easy to make and amazing, please make them soon) for Eloise's baptism brunch last week:

That's my mom doing the baptism! She's an Episcopal priest which works out nicely because Eloise didn't wiggle around or fuss for her "GiGi" while she poured the water on her head the way many babies do!

Then when I woke up on Saturday morning at 4:30 am with my little early-risers I decided to make this Pumpkin Bread from AllRecipes- I have tried a few other pumpkin bread recipes but this one really is the best, very moist and very spicy.


Anyway, onto the pie! I really like pumpkin pie, but it's never been a family favorite for Thanksgiving: my dad likes it, my Uncle Bobby likes it, and that's about it. So I've made a plain old back of the can Libby's Pumpkin Pie for Thanksgiving once or twice but it never gets eaten the way that pecan, apple, and cranberry pie do. I was excited to try a different pumpkin pie recipe, especially because Dorie describes the pie as a more sophisticated and unusual pumpkin pie because of the very dark (almost black) caramel that is mixed into the usual pumpkin pie components. I really liked this pie, and so did Eloise, but Helen and Derrick didn't even touch it, so we ended up with quite a bit that didn't get eaten. The pie is still pumpkin-y but it has that smokey, sweet-bitter burnt sugar flavor too. Two things that surprised me about this pie were that 1) the caramel does not taste very sweet on it's own so I was concerned that the pie would be very bitter, but the pie itself has a wonderful flavor- no need to worry! 2) Dorie says that the pie shouldn't jiggle at all and that a knife will come out clean when the pie is done. My pie took about 7 extra minutes to bake and then I went ahead and pulled it out even though it still jiggled and the knife was not completely clean and the consistency of the pie was perfect once it had time to cool.

The thing that impressed me most about this pie was how crisp and flaky my crust stayed! Even with a partially baked crust, I've never really been able to keep the crust on my pumpkin pies from getting soft- but Dorie's Good For Almost Anything Pie Crust did the trick! I would definitely make this again and I'm going to try the almond streusel topping from the playing around section!

TWD: All in One Holiday Bundt

I'm very thankful for many things this Thanksgiving season: good health, a new addition to our family, a comfortable place to live, a loving family, and the fact that this month Tuesdays with Dorie is allowing it's members to post November recipes in any order they wish (as long as the post is on a Tuesday)!! I went to Sam's Club on Friday and stocked up on Fall baking supplies. I got a giant bag of crisp, sweet Gala apples, four pounds of butter, a sack of fresh cranberries, and a three pack of pumpkin puree. In retrospect I might have gone a bit overboard...but isn't that what Sam's is all about? So I just had to make this cake which was chosen by Britin of The Nitty Britty (recipe will appear on her blog later this month and can of course be found in Baking From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan). The All in One Holiday Bundt is just that: pumpkin, Fall spices, diced apple, fresh cranberries, and pecans all rolled into a super-moist, flavorful cake.



I will probably make this cake again later this week- it was just that good...and I have plenty of ingredients on hand.

TWD: Thanksgiving Twofer Pie

Vibi from La Casserole Carree chose Thanksgiving Twofer Pie for this week's Tuesdays with Dorie recipe. I would have loved to have brought this to Thanksgiving dinner in Tennessee but I didn't have access to a kitchen for a long period of time and the pie would not have lasted from Saturday until Thursday- so alas, I had to make the Thursday before Thanksgiving. I thought of it as a sort of warm up for the big day. This pie is such a great idea that it's kind of crazy that it hasn't become a more popular Thanksgiving dessert. It is a mix of pumpkin pie on the bottom and pecan pie on the top- a perfect pairing!

Now this was also my first time using Dorie's pie crust recipe- and I have to say that I'm a bit undecided as to wether or not I like it yet! The crust came together very easily in the food processor. It uses a mix of (mostly) butter and (a bit of) shortening- so you get the buttery taste with a little more forgiving dough. If you had asked me what I though of the crust at this stage:


I would have undoubtedly said "I love it! I won't go back to my old standard!" but after I pre-baked the crust it had some little rips on the sides which was somewhat disapointing.


Then the even stranger thing was that the recipe called for pre-baking the crust for about 28 minutes and then baking the pie for something like 45 minutes- so that poor crust was in the oven for over an hour! I ended up putting a crust shield on top of it for the last 20 or so minutes but I still found it to be very dark brown. I can't say that it tasted like I'd burned it exactly, it was just very close to edge...


The fillings were fantastic though! I loved the consistency and taste of the creamy pumpkin filling and the delicious crunch and flavor of the pecan topping! I honestly love that combo! I think I'll try prebaking for a shorter period of time when I make this pie again- and I will be baking this again- I don't think I can go back to regular pumpkin pie ever again!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

This is going to be a short post because we're heading out to Sewanee, TN in the morning to spend Thanksgiving week with the in-laws! I can't wait for them to see how much our little Helen Mae has grown up. I have been seeing a lot of posts about pumpkin cookies on the blogs lately- and I had never tried them before- so since I'm such a big pumpkin fan I decided to make the most popular recipe listed on All Recipes for Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies.


These cookies are made with oil instead of butter and the consisentency is much more cake-like than cookie-like. The flavor is very good- the spices and chocolate go well together- but I've never been a huge fan of cakey cookies. So, the veredict: I doubt I'd make these again, but I can't pretend that they weren't all eaten up! So have a happy Thanksgiving everyone- I'm going to have a few posts go up while I'm gone but I won't have any internet access in good ole' rocky top so I'll have to catch up with everyone when I return!

Holla! for Pumpkin Challah

Ok sorry for the cheesy title but every time my sister said "challah" she would say "challah!" as in "challah at ya' boy!". Ok, on to bigger and better things. This was my first time making challah- and although this is not a very traditional recipe (because of the pumpkin and spices added to it) I know that I definitely want to make it again! This wonderful recipe comes from the very talented and very creative, Alejandra, of Alway Order Dessert. Her blog is such a pleasure to read! When she mentioned eating pumpkin challah french toast in a post about making the perfect bacon all I could think about was that pumpkin challah- forget bacon! Well, to my delight, she posted about the challah only days later!


So I went out and bought all of the ingredients so that I'd have them on hand when the urge to spend the day watching dough proof hit me. And hit me it did- I don't know how I sensed it- but my little helper, Helen Mae, was in a particularly helpful mood last Tuesday. She took two (2) real (more than 20 minute) naps on Tuesday (I'm not lying)- leaving me with plenty of time to get these glamorous loaves ready to pop out of the oven by 4:00! Just in time for Helen Mae's dinner: She loves pumpkin challah! I mean she really loves it!

Anyway, the bread came out beautifully in texture (my loaves pale in comparison to Alejandra's beautifully braided ones!). Oh, and don't be nervous about the amount of spice in the recipe- it seems like a lot of cinnamon and ginger- but it tastes like the perfect amount. This is not a sweet as in sugary challah- so if that is what you are expecting you can adjust the amount of sugar. I thought it was best the morning after I made it but it was also wonderful the morning after that, toasted with butter.

I took the liberty of detailing (at least part of the) process with pictures, in the case that you, like me, have not made challah before, and were wondering what the stages might look like (a bit of hubris on my part- because for all I know this is exactly how the stages should not look! but, my the bread was delicious- so let's go on that!)

Yeast mixture after it sat for 15 minutes:


After the second rise:


The "sea creature" getting ready to be braided-oh and you should really try this six stranded braid- it isn't any more difficult than a three stranded braid:


braids getting ready to proof:


braids getting ready to be put in the oven:


final product:

So make this challah and "challah at ya' girl" if you do!

TWD: Pumpkin Muffins

Ok so I sort of fell behind this week with Tuesdays with Dorie. This week Kelly from Sounding My Barbaric Gulp! picked some lovely pumpkin muffins for us to bake. I went shopping for the ingredients last night- but because I was house-sitting in a different neighborhood I couldn't find everything I needed at the grocery store- namely pumpkin. Dorie's recipe calls for unsweetened pumpkin puree- well I thought that would be easy enough to find because it's almost Thanksgiving and everyone is making pumpkin pies, pumpkin bread, pumpkin soup, etc. Well, this is all I could find:


It's organic, which is nice, but it already had cane syrup, cloves, cinnamon, and about five other spices in it. I was brave and I used it anyway. I omitted the brown sugar and reduced the amount of white sugar and completely did without the spices that Dorie calls for- so it was sort of like her recipe. Oh yeah, and did I mention that the store only carried low-fat buttermilk?


So I mixed it all up last night, realized I was really late for something, stuck it in the fridge, and pulled it out this morning. Let's just say the consistency was very different this morning-much, much thicker- which I had of course anticipated. So I baked them up anyway- what did I have to lose? Well, they turned out pretty good- if I hadn't known about all of my little snafus- I would probably have loved them- but you know how it is when you wonder if they would have been even better if everything had been just right? These have a great dense and moist texture- and I actually loved the addition of the raisins and the sunflower seeds. I will definitely make these again... and I will use all the proper ingredients and mix them and immediately bake them!