Halloween treats

I am such a sucker for Halloween marketing. Christmas too, but we're not quite there yet. Anyway, if it's black and orange I can't control my feet - they just walk me right on over to take a peek. Hubby's (legitimate) complaints that our holiday decorations are taking over our small storage closet have become an inner voice, which is probably for the better, and I haven't splurged on anything yet this year. Just a tiny bit of festive consumerism - I couldn't pass by the Halloween sprinkles at Williams-Sonoma.

I didn't even have any baking planned, or really anyone to pass off a bunch of baked goods to. Keeping them all in our house is just too dangerous. :)

I did, however, have a sugar pumpkin sitting around from our apple picking trip, and with a quick bit of internet browsing I found a cupcake recipe to let Kirah help me with. This one comes from the My Kitchen Addiction blog.

I'm not a big frosting fan. Not even a huge fan of sweets, really. But if it has 'pumpkin' in the name I'm sold, and these cupcakes are insane. I actually had to go and get a pumpkin spice latté from Starbucks to drink with one because I swear they taste exactly the same. Plus the pumpkin gives the cake the most wonderful fluffy texture that was almost enough to make me eat every last one before I sent Hubs off to work with them.


Don't they look....errr... well, at least KINDA cute?

I just made a few changes to the recipe. I made a simple vanilla cream cheese frosting instead of the one suggested, and I made my own pumpkin purée rather than using canned. If you haven't made your own before please give it a try! It is so much brighter and fresher tasting than the canned kind (which I hear is made from butternut squash and not pumpkin anyway), and it's nice to have some around to add to pancakes or yogurt or oatmeal or... anything else you can think of!

Pumpkin Purée

No ingredient list for this recipe - you'll just need one good looking sugar pumpkin! You can also do this with any variety of squash - just adjust the cooking time for the size.

Preheat oven to 425°F. Cut pumpkin in half, lengthwise. Scoop out the seeds and pulp with a spoon (save the seeds for roasting if you're up for it!). Place both halves cut-side down on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 1 to 1 1/2 hours, depending on the size of your pumpkin. When it is soft and the flesh comes away easily from the skin, it's done. Scoop all of the flesh out into a food processor and blend until very smooth.

To get a canned-like consistency you can strain it with a paper towel or cheesecloth lined sieve, but I just leave it as is.

Ducks

Went to Cottage Lake last weekend to feed the ducks. They must get fed often because they came right up to us before we even pulled out the bread, as if they were expecting lunch. They also followed us around long after they had eaten it all.









A good little day trip for a cold and drizzly weekend.

Apple Picking

This past weekend I talked my husband into driving over the mountains to Wenatchee to a u-pick apple farm. I had to bribe him with homemade soft pretzels, but he agreed, and we had a great trip!

With a make-shift clipboard for her coloring pages, little one did wonderfully on the long car ride, and she slept most of the way back. While we were there she had a blast helping pick out the tastiest looking apples, chasing assorted farm animals, and uhh.... digging in the dirt with sticks. :)

It was a long trip for something we could have easily bought in the grocery store near home, and the slight cost difference hardly made up for what we spent in gas, but ohmigosh, these apples are amazing. Right off the tree they taste like straight apple juice - sugary and tart and SO GOOD. Besides that, any chance to show Kirah where her food comes from - to have her meet the people growing her snacks, to see the fruit on the trees, to touch the leaves and hear the noise of the chickens that fertilize the plants - well, it's priceless.

Ooh, it just makes me want to buy a farm and move to the middle of nowhere!




Stutzman Ranch in Wenatchee, WA