Pumpkin Biscuits

Pumpkin and/or cranberries make an appearance in just about every meal I make this time of year. I needed a biscuit to go with grits and bacon for a lazy Saturday morning, so these pumpkin biscuits were perfect.

The dough is quite moist, so the key to keeping the biscuits flaky is a light hand with the flour and gentle kneading.

I was so eager to eat these I only managed an iPhone photo. The recipe yielded a tender, flaky biscuit, slightly sweet from the brown sugar and scented softly with a hint of pumpkin pie spices. With the salty bacon, they were magnificent.

Pumpkin Biscuits

1-3/4 cups unbleached flour, plus additional for rolling
1/4 cup brown sugar, packed
2-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup cold salted butter
3/4 cup canned pumpkin
1/3 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 425°.

Whisk together flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and spices. Cut in 1/2 cup butter until coarse crumbs form. Combine pumpkin and buttermilk in separate bowl; stir into flour mixture just until moistened.

Scrape dough onto lightly floured surface and knead gently 3 or 4 times, sprinkling on a tiny bit of flour to keep from sticking. Pat or roll to 1-inch thickness and cut with floured biscuit cutter. Place 1 inch apart on baking sheet.

Bake 15-18 minutes or until golden brown.

Makes about a dozen. Yield depends on size of biscuit cutter. I got 11 using a 2-1/2 inch cutter.

Vanilla Roasted Pear Muffins

After enjoying these ambrosial pears with our roasted chicken dinner the other night, I took the leftovers and pureed them, strained out (and saved to freeze) as much juice as I could, and ended up with a cup of beautiful pear sauce. This provided just the right ingredient for perfectly moist, tender muffins that actually did have a faint taste of pear, which is difficult to taste in most baked goods. The streusel provided just enough sweet crunch.

Vanilla Roasted Pear Muffins
Makes about 48 mini muffins*

Muffins
2-1/4 cups self-rising flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/3 cup buttermilk
2 eggs, slightly beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla
2/3 cup white sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 cup vanilla roasted pear puree (from this recipe)


Streusel
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 cup salted butter, diced

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Spray mini-muffin pans with cooking spray.

For streusel, mix flour, sugars, and cinnamon; cut in butter with a pastry cutter until small crumbs are formed.

For muffins, whisk together flour and spices; set aside. Mix together buttermilk, eggs, and vanilla; set aside.

Combine sugars, oil, and pear puree; add buttermilk mixture and mix until well blended. Fold in dry ingredients and stir until just combined.

Divide the batter evenly in pans; sprinkle streusel over tops. Bake until tops spring back when touched, about 15 minutes. Cool pan on a wire rack for 5 minutes before removing the muffins from the pan.

*Although the recipe indicates 48 muffins, I ended up with enough batter for an additional dozen regular sized muffins.

Vanilla Roasted Pears

These vanilla-infused pears were tender, fragrant, and totally satisfied my sweet tooth. I found the recipe on the blog of An Edible Mosaic, whose author, Faith Gorsky, has a cookbook being published this fall. I used a combination of Bosc and Red pears, and I found the Bosc to be superior for baking because they were tender yet retained their firmness. The red pears, while delicious, were almost reduced to sauce.

I barely changed the recipe, using lime juice in place of lemon (simply because that's what I had), salted butter (because I always think sweet needs just a touch of salt), and a whisper of cinnamon.

Vanilla Roasted Pears
adapted from the blog of An Edible Mosaic
Serves 4 to 6

2 tablespoons white sugar
2 tablespoons brown sugar, lightly packed
1/2 vanilla bean, split in half lengthwise and seeds scraped out
6 medium (about 2 lb) pears, any firm variety
2 tablespoons lemon juice
3 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons salted butter, diced
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375F. Spray baking dish with cooking spray. Combine sugars and vanilla seeds in small bowl and set aside; reserve vanilla pod.

Peel pears or leave them unpeeled if the skin is unblemished; cut in half lengthwise, scoop out core. Arrange pears cut side up in baking dish.

Drizzle lemon juice over pears, dot tops with butter, and sprinkle on cinnamon. Pour water into dish and place vanilla pod in bottom.

Roast until pears are tender and caramelized and sauce is slightly thickened, about 35 minutes, depending on ripeness of pears. Flip pears midway through baking and occasionally basted wotj juices from bottom of baking dish.

Pour pan juices into small pitcher and serve with pears.

I saved my leftovers and pureed them to use in muffins, which I will blog about later this week.

An Edible Mosaic

Pumpkin Cookies with Praline Icing

If you are like me and in the mood for fall flavors, this pumpkin cookie should be on your list of must-makes. This is simply one of the best cookies I have ever eaten - really.

Sarah at In Praise of Leftovers posts some of the best cookie recipes I have found in blogger-land. She generously shared this family recipe, which has now become one of my family's favorite recipes. I made these for my son and DIL and three grandchildren yesterday, and we all went wild for them. We normally send leftovers home with them, but we were fighting over the last 8 cookies and finally just divided them.

After sampling two from the first batch and deciding I must photograph and blog about them, I was so distracted by how good they were I forgot to take a picture of the interior, which is soft, just sweet enough, and just pumpkiny enough. Warm from the oven these remind me of pumpkin pie. Although they are delicious on their own, in my opinion the icing just sets it off.

I made some very tiny adjustments to Sarah's recipe, adding ginger, in place of pumpkin pie spice, and vanilla to the dough and maple flavor to the icing. Visit her site for the lovely story that accompanies the cookies. Her recipe - the cookies, the icing, and the instructions - is spot-on perfect.

Pumpkin Cookies
adapted from the blog In Praise of Leftovers

1 cup salted butter, softened to room temp
1 cup white sugar
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg (regular ground nutmeg is fine)
1/4 teaspoon salt
chopped pecans for garnish

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

With mixer, combine butter, sugar, and pumpkin and mix until combined. Add egg and vanilla and mix well. Mixture will appear curdled.

Whisk together dry ingredients. With spatula, gradually fold flour mixture into batter and mix until just combined.

Drop by heaping tablespoon onto parchment-covered cookie sheet and bake until barely golden and baked in center, 10-12 minutes. (Mine were perfectly done in 12 minutes – I turned the cookies sheets midway through baking.)

Cool for two minutes, then frost or drizzle with icing while still warm. Makes 24-30 cookies

Icing
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
3 tablespoons salted butter
4-5 teaspoons milk
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon maple flavoring
1 cup sifted powdered sugar

In small saucepan, combine brown sugar, butter, and milk over low heat just until sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat, add flavorings; whisk in powdered sugar until smooth.

Ice cookies while cookies and icing are warm. Sprinkle with nuts, if desired, while icing is still wet.