Family Thing

When most people make a pumpkin pie they will use a can of pumpkin. Not my youngest daughter! A couple of weeks ago we went to a farmer’s market and she picked up a few pie pumpkins to make her famous Pumpkin Pie From a Real Pumpkin. Sure canned pumpkin is real, but she takes the time to cut the pumpkin, take out the seeds, cook the pumpkin to perfection, remove the pumpkin skin and THEN put together the pie after that. I am pretty impressed. Apparently she is making pies for all of her friends (they all asked for one) so she needs a lot of pumpkins. I think she picked up 3 that day but had purchased a few before that.

With Thanksgiving right around the corner you are going to need pumpkin pie.

Here is her delicious recipe for Perfect Pumpkin Pie:

First, cook the pumpkin (cut in half and place down on a cookie sheet with aluminum foil) at 350 degrees for 55-60 min, or until soft. Remove flesh from rind. Then follow this recipe:

Ingredients:

1 pie size pumpkin (15 oz.)
1 (14 oz.) sweetened condensed milk
2 large eggs
1 t. ground cinnamon
1/2 t. ground ginger
1/2 t. ground nutmeg
1/2 t. salt
1 (9 in.) unbaked pie crust

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Whisk pumpkin, sweetened condensed milk, eggs, spices and salt in medium bowl until smooth. Pour into crust. Bake 15 min.

2. REDUCE OVEN TEMPERATURE TO 350 DEGREES F AND CONTINUE BAKING 35-40 MIN. or until knife inserted 1 inch from crust comes out clean. Cool. Garnish as desired. Store leftovers covered in refrigerator.

My favorite holiday cookie is the sugar cookie. I love to make them for Valentine’s Day, Easter, Independence Day, and Halloween. But most of all I love making them for Christmas because I love to cut them out into these cute little wreaths.

Holiday Sugar Cookies

1 cup butter or margarine, softened
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla
2 tsp baking powder
3 cups flour

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Cream butter and sugar together. Add eggs and vanilla. Add baking powder and flour one cup at a time, mixing well. The dough will be very stiff. Do not chill. Roll into 1/8 inch thick and dip cutters in flour before each use. Bake for 4 to 6 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool and then remove from cookie sheet.

One of our family’s favorite cookies is the chocolate chipper. Who doesn’t love a warm chocolate chip cookie right from the oven? Because this is such a popular cookie in our house we thought it would probably be just as popular in our neighbors’ houses as well.

To keep an abundant supply of cookies always baking in our house, we will make dough balls with a medium size scoop. Then throw them in the freezer and freeze overnight. When dough balls are frozen they store easily in gallon size zip lock bags.

For Christmas we decided to share these delicious cookies with our neighbors and gave them a bag of dough balls to cook whenever they were in the mood for a warm batch of cookies. We attached this cute little card with directions and delivered several bags around the neighborhood.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 ½ cups granulated sugar
2 cups brown sugar
1 lb butter, softened
3 eggs
1 ½ tsp salt
1 ½ tsp baking soda
2 tablespoons vanilla
6 cups flour
2–4 cups chocolate chips
2 cups chopped nuts

In your KitchenAid Professional Stand Mixer,  cream sugar, brown sugar and butter until creamy.
Add eggs and vanilla and mix well.
Add dry ingredients combing well.
Add chocolate chips.
Drop by cookie scoop onto ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake in preheated 350 degree oven for 10 – 12 minutes.

Makes 5 dozen cookies.

Follow this link for the for the Christmas Tag:

Christmas Dough Tag PDF

This morning I woke up and I found this on my table:

Do you know what that means? Time to make the banana bread! Yea! We all cheer because old bananas can turn into one of our favorite treats.

So I took those bananas and I did this:

And used my Grandma Dody’s Award Winning Banana Bread Recipe to make this:

1 pkg. (21.5 oz.) fudge brownie mix
1/4 c. flour
1/4 c. vegetable oil
3 tbsp. water
2 eggs
1/2 c. chopped nuts (optional)
1 c. chocolate chips (optional)
Combine all ingredients, mixing by hand. Place onto greased cookie sheet with small cookie scoop. Bake until just set at 350 degrees about 9-10 minutes. Cool
(If using a smaller brownie mix, add more flour)

Frosting Middles
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup peanut butter (smooth or chunky)
4 -ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
4 cups confectioners’ sugar
2 tablespoons milk (or more to desired consistency)

Mix all ingredients together for a light and fluffy frosting.
Using same size scoop, place frosting between 2 cookies and press together, Oreo style.