Tastes of Fall

In continued effort to elevate myself to an official domestic diva I have been baking a bit this past week. I made 2 different Pioneer Woman recipes, roasted and pureed a fresh pumpkin, and made homemade applesauce. Of course I did all this during a week when we have not had any sugar at all around here (yeah right....only 37 pounds from all the Halloween pre-parties, parties, and after parties).

The flat apple pie (from PW's cookbook) I made earlier in the week tasted ok but after the juice ran off the pan and onto the floor of the oven and the house filled with smoke in about 13 seconds it just kinda ruined it for me. I had to take it out, move it to another pan and.... side bar: have you ever tried to move 1/2 baked dough- yeah well it wasn't pretty..back to the story.... clean the oven (ok-confession-my helper actually did this part) and then wait for the oven to reheat and complete the baking process. The juice was definitely missed but the apples had a good flavor and the dough, although ugly, turned out ok. I'll make it again but I'll be sure open my windows BEFORE I begin. Looks like the domestic diva has got a ways to go.

That being said, I did have a successful creation this week that was oh so delicious. It's fall and that always makes me hungry for apples and pumpkins and turkey and pumkin spice lattes and I could go on and on. Well..... since canned pumpkin costs almost $8 per can here I resorted to going old school and roasted and pureed it myself. My friend Carleigh talked me through it and I gotta say.....it's way easy and so good. So I had a very large bowl of pumpkin (that only costs $2.) in the fridge that I have been looking for ways to use it. I found this recipe and tried it on Saturday. Pumpkin Creme Pies were a hit with my both my adult friends and their kids that we had a little dinner party with that night. They are a soft pumpkin sandwich cookie with a sweet cream cheese filling that is wonderful. I highly recommend that you make these and you should do it rather soon......so that you can make them again.....I promise you will want to.

They are a bit more work than a regular cookie but oh-so-worth-it. The parchment paper squares are key so be sure to use them when baking- the cookies are very soft and the parchment paper allows you to handle them without using a spatula and breaking them. Also....I had alot of pineapple cream cheese so I used that when making the cream filling. It was a very good move b/c the pineapple was subtle but very nice. Be sure to put the cream cheese mixture in a baggie and pipe it on- much easier. You should store them in the fridge too. I saved the parchment squares and used them as separators and it worked great.

So....enough for now. I'm certainly no food blogger but I had to tell you about these and I do hope you enjoy. Xan sure did!!

Chat with ya later.