Fall Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies

Do you ever find yourself with one cup of pumpkin puree just sitting there in your fridge, a day or two after baking something delicious?  And you think to yourself…what could I do with one cup of pumpkin?  That’s what I was doing yesterday (when I should have been doing something else).  After a few clicks around online, I found this yummy-sounding recipe for Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies, with ingredients mostly found in my house!!  I adapted the recipe from Family Fresh Meals and cut out the stuff I didn’t have.  I also made some modifications because my mixer is deceased and I had to mix everything the old fashioned way…by hand!  Thus the melted butter.  So the recipe is written as if you are going to whisk things by hand. Feel free to use a mixer 😉

I’ve never had pumpkin spice in my spice rack, so I improvised.  (You could also pre-mix some for yourself, find it on this idea page).Are you excited about fall, and baking with pumpkin?  How about pumpkin+chocolate chips+oatmeal?  Doesn’t that sound good?  Ok, ok, here comes the recipe:

Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

1 1/2 cups semi sweet chocolate chips

2 cups flour

2 cups oatmeal

1 tsp. cinnamon, 1/2 tsp. ginger, 1/2 tsp. nutmeg, 1/4 tsp. ground cloves, 1/4 tsp. ground allspice

                                            OR  1/2 tsp. cinnamon and 2 tsp. pumpkin spice instead

1 Tbsp. vanilla

1/2 tsp. salt

1 cup butter (salted or unsalted)

1 tsp. baking soda

1 cup pumpkin puree (I use canned)

1 egg

 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  In any old bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients: flour, baking soda,  spices and salt. Set aside.

2. Melt butter in a  large microwaveable bowl, add sugar and brown sugar and whisk or beat until mixed together.

3. Now add in pumpkin puree, egg and vanilla. Beat or whisk until well combined.

4. Gradually add the dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix until incorporated.

5. Now stir in the oats. Mix well.

6. And lastly, stir in the  chocolate chips.  Cover well with plastic wrap and refrigerate for while. (or not. You could do that while you get a cookie pan+baking parchment paper ready)

7. Drop cookie dough by the rounded tablespoon on to the prepared baking sheet.  I tried pressing some of them down with a fork (for the photos) but ended leaving the rest mounded up because I liked the texture better that way, so they were smaller, thicker cookies.

8. Bake cookies for about 14  minutes (cookies are lightly browned). DO NOT OVER COOK. They will seem a little soft, but will firm up as they cool. You want to keep the nice, soft texture!  So here’s the recipe in photos, since I was having fun in the kitchen instead of doing other things…

oooo I love this photo with the vanilla swirling around the island of pumpkin…

whisk up the yumminess!

the dry ingredients

add that snow-like powder!

the chocolate chips weren’t really purple….they were Costco, ethically sourced chocolate…

oops, the oatmeal was mixed in before the chocochips actually

I was going to include a few spoonfuls of molasses in this recipe, but then realized my cupboard was bare!  Anyways, everyone liked these cookies, they are very soft and are getting softer…though they are disappearing fast.  And here are the winning “after” photos:I found it hard to do the cookies justice in the photos.  They were nice and warm and just jumped off the plate into my hand and into my mouth….The cookies could have been larger, maybe they would have looked more awesome.  Here they are on my favorite fall plate…and now they are… gone….

(so much for my facebook photo voting…I just didn’t want to disappoint anyone, so felt I should add all the cookie photos here. Thanks guys! Wish you could’ve stopped by and had some cookies and tea with me!  Maybe next time…)🙂

3D Cookies for Valentine’s Day

How do you say Happy Valentine’s Day to those you love?  Flowers, candy, cards, or some even bigger display?  Or do you prefer to do something special together?  Or is it one of those days that just slips by?  I saw a funny “quote” the other day.  It was a photo from Star Wars and the caption was “I’ll be celebrating Valentine’s Day Han’s style….Solo!”  Maybe that’s more you 🙂

We don’t make a super big hoohaw about Valentine’s Day, a few special things, like maybe chocolate or sometimes flowers.  I’m usually in favor of homemade or home-printed Valentines.  (OK, I admit sometimes I put way too much work into the “homemade” Valentines that the kids take to school.  But this year, I put in 10 minutes of work on a printable, and then they are on their own, I’m just too tired,with a been there, done that  kind of feeling).  Anwyays, I came up with a brilliant idea that I think will make a memorable Valentine’s Day for us this year:  The kids are in charge of making and serving supper for my husband and I.  Sounds a tad dangerous, but I intend to enjoy it!  We’ll see how it goes…

After having said that, I admit I did make a few Valentine’s cookies.  I had the dough in the fridge and a few more M&Ms from the last couple of posts! 🙂  And I had these cute letter cookie cutters to try out!  (A fun gift from a friend)  So here goes a little tutorial for some fairly easy, but attention-getting cookies.

Ingredients:  chocolate cookie dough and candy melts (I use Wilton brand) and letter cookie cutters (or just freehand it) and small heart cutters.Amor= love in Spanish 😉  Galletas=Cookies!   Cut out letters and a bunch of small or medium hearts for bases.Bake and let cool…..cool!Melt up some red and white candy melts and get ready to pipe them out of baggies with only a tiny corner snipped off…Squeeze strings of candy melt out while moving back and forth over all the letters.  Repeat with next color.Then pick up each letter and break off the extra bits of candy melt off the sides, this is really easy and works well.Line up the letters and the bases, some letters need two hearts for their bases.Use some more candy melt to attach the bases, I used dark cocoa candy melts (only took 3 melts)Holding the letters in place for about 5 seconds was mostly enough to balance the letters, but if necessary, prop them up for a bit…The candy melts set up quite quickly.  Here’s the bird’s eye view:And there you go!  The letters are quite sturdy and just so fun looking!  Great for a Valentine’s Day centerpiece.Oh wait!  Since you have the cookie dough out, and maybe a few extra cookies baked, go ahead and decorate some more for your centerpiece.  Here’s how I did it with Nutella and M&Ms using the same idea from the other day’s post: The kids wanted to cut out some Os and Xs for hugs and kisses, so I used up the last of the red M&Ms on these:And here’s one for you from me (sorry it’s not edible but I’m all about digital stuff)

I’d love to hear from you if you try out some of my little cookie techniques! 🙂

Happy New Year with a Gingerbread Snoopy’s Doghouse

I’m a bit late with my New Year’s Greetings, but that’s nothing new! 🙂  (At least it’s still January)  Here’s Snoopy, apparently fast asleep atop his doghouse, but in reality he’s thinking deep thoughts about the new year, and wishing the best for you and yours in 2014.We did a gingerbread decorating day with my sister and all of our kids, and after the frosting stopped flying, and the kids rumbled off to their next activity, I assembled this gingerbread doghouse for cookie Snoopy.  I used the birdhouse pattern that I printed from the instructions here, and just trimmed in the roof sections a bit and cut out the doorway.  Then decorated with royal icing and nonpareil snowflakes.  Snoopy is such a comforting image from my childhood!   Here’s Snoopy’s doghouse with some Christmas lights that I swiped from my nephew…..They didn’t stay on too long when my nephew finally noticed them….! I just love gingerbread!!  YUM!  I usually end up making some in February, too, not just for Christmas!  Anyways, have a great New Year!