Pumpkin Pie!

On Thanksgiving morning, TLMM made this gorgeous pumpkin pie! I am getting the recipe together and will post it soon. In the meantime, I downloaded the photographs, saw this one, and just had to share. Food porn at its finest...and the eggs.

Pumpkin Cookies!

Bake up a batch of these, it's easy, quick and the kids love 'em! I have seen a few recipes for pumpkin cookies, but decided to use Marilyn Moon's recipe since it has been tried and tested through a few generations!  

Follow the directions on her card, above, as I did!  I made a simple butter frosting and frosted half of the cookies.

Sift flour, baking soda and salt.  Set aside.  Cream sugar, crisco and eggs.  Add vanilla and pumpkin.  

Add flour mixture a bit at a time.  Mix well.  You can add chocolate chips (baby or regular size) at this point if desired.

Drop spoonfuls on greased cookie sheet.  We used a tablespoon amount of dough.

Bake at 350 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes.

We doubled the recipe and made enough to fill a large and a small tin.  Freeze what you don't plan to use within a day or two- it keeps the cookies fresh.  I iced half of them with the following simple butter frosting recipe:

1/3 cup butter
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 pound (3 1/2 cups) sifted confectioners sugar
3 to 4 tablespoons milk  

Frost after cookies have cooled completely. Let the cookies sit on the counter for a few minutes until frosting hardens.

Happy Thanksgiving...and the eggs.

Toasted Spiced Pecans!

It's the most wonderful time of the year... time to start planning and baking and dreaming about those foods we pour our hearts into during the holidays. This year, my holiday baking started with a trip to Robert is Here and bags of fresh pecans!

4 cups shelled pecans (do as I say, not as I do)
1 stick butter
1 tablespoon Lowery's seasoned salt
2 teaspoons Worchestershire sauce



Shell the pecans. This takes finesse. Finesse that I thought I had but found out that I don't. Hopefully you bought shelled nuts.  The close-up was meant to hide the fact that most of the nuts were in pieces instead of halves.



Melt butter in a large skillet. Add salt and Worchestershire sauce. Mix. Add pecans. Stir until well coated. Spread them out on one layer in jelly roll pan. Bake at 300 degrees for 30 minutes, stirring after 15. Place on paper towels to dry and cool.

As you can see, these are quite easy.  When you taste them (as long as you bought shelled), you realize they are deceptively easy- the people you share them with will think there is a lot more to making them than there is.  These are a real crowd pleaser!  If you aren't going to eat them within a couple of days, place them in an airtight container in the freezer.  One holiday recipe down, many more to go- pumpkin cookie recipe coming next...and the eggs.