I don’t participate in the current craze for pumpkin-spice EVERYTHING. Still, I like to make something new every fall that involves pumpkin. This fall it was some simple cupcakes: moist and tasty, easy to share with a crowd.
I like them with cream-cheese frosting, but the icing is up to you. In fact, you may choose to eschew frosting altogether and call them pumpkin muffins.
I made them this past week on television, along with my beloved broccoli soup. The combination made a perfect simple supper the next evening.
3/4 cup canola oil
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1-1/2 cups flour
1 cup pumpkin puree
1/2 cup coconut
1/2 cup raisins
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line 16 muffin tins with paper liners. (You may end up with slightly more or fewer cupcakes.)
Mix the oil and sugar in a large bowl. Add the eggs 1 at a time, beating well after each egg. Beat in the vanilla, followed by the baking powder, the baking soda, and the spices. Stir in the flour, followed by the pumpkin, the coconut, and the raisins.
Spoon the batter into the prepared tins. Bake until the cakes tests done, about 20 to 25 minutes. Frost with your favorite frosting (or not!). Makes about 16 cupcakes.
Trish Crapo, a fellow freelance writer, took this photo of me prepping the soup on “Mass Appeal” last week.
We are enjoying a roller-coaster of a fall here in New England. At first we thought there might be NO color, thanks to the very dry weather of the past few months. A couple of weeks ago the trees apparently got tired of being drab and started turning gorgeous shades of orange and yellow, along with just a little red.
The temperature has also vacillated. A couple of weeks ago we were routinely very cold. Last week suddenly Indian summer arrived. Over the weekend just as suddenly things turned raw and cold. I hope it doesn’t snow too soon—but I’m not sure that it won’t.
It’s now officially soup weather. I love soup in any weather, but somehow it seems most fitting when temperatures are plummeting. This simple blended soup is warm, hearty, spicy, and even healthy. All the vegetables are in season—at least here in New England.
Seeing cauliflower at a farm stand made me think of the wonderful spicy Indian cauliflower dish aloo gobi. My soup is loosely inspired by it. I’ve never seen aloo gobi that included carrots, but I had a ton of carrots from my farm share so in they went!
Thanks to my cousin Kate Corwin for coming up with the idea of using chopped cashews (following the Indian theme) as a garnish. The gang loved that addition when I made the soup on Mass Appeal last week.
1 small to medium (or 1/2 large) cauliflower
2 large carrots
1 large onion
2 cloves garlic
olive oil as needed for roasting
1 quart chicken or vegetable broth
curry powder to taste (if it is hot, use 1/2 teaspoon; if mild, at least 1 teaspoon)
1 teaspoon cumin seed
salt to taste
1 tablespoon honey
the juice of 1/2 lemon, plus more juice to taste
Greek yogurt for garnish (optional; even better if you put some chopped chives and parsley in it)
chopped roasted cashews for an additional garnish
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Roughly chop the cauliflower, carrots, and onion. Toss those vegetables in a small amount of oil, and place them on a rimmed cookie sheet. Place the garlic cloves on a small sheet of aluminum foil, drizzle a little olive oil on top, and close the foil around the garlic. Place the covered garlic on the cookie sheet as well, and roast the vegetables for 1/2 hour, stirring and turning them after 15 minutes.
After removing the vegetables from the oven open the pouch of garlic and smash the cloves. Place all the vegetables in a 5-quart Dutch oven. Stir in the broth, curry powder, cumin, salt, and honey.
Bring the soup to a boil; then reduce the heat, cover the pot, and simmer the soup for 1/2 hour. When it has finished cooking, blend it with an immersion blender. (You may also use a regular blender, but in that case blend it in very small batches and watch out for burning.) Just before serving stir in the lemon juice. Adjust seasonings to taste.
Serve with a dollop of Greek yogurt and a few cashew pieces if you like. Serves 4 to 6.
Here is the video. For some reason there is a gap in the recording beginning 42 seconds in and lasting for almost 50 seconds. Feel free to fast forward during that section!
Halloween begins to weave its spell at the Casa Tinky.
Pumpkin season is here, and I’m embracing it. Part of my love for pumpkin at this time of year is related to its remarkable color. I savor the way its orange reflects our New England trees (and inspires me to start decorating the house for Halloween!).
I enjoy cooking with pumpkin as well as looking at the fruit, of course; it melds beautifully with a variety of sweet and savory flavors. I am particularly happy when pumpkin preparation involves baking. I spend much of the summer avoiding turning on my oven—but when fall arrives I welcome the chance to give the house that extra measure of heat.
Fall baking doesn’t only make us feel warm. It fills the house with lovely aromas that remind us of childhood pleasures. This particular pumpkin dessert smells divine in the oven; scents of cinnamon, cloves, ginger, and butter waft through the house and tempt even the most virtuous dieter.
I adapted the recipe from one a friend sent me last year; the original came from an old community cookbook.
The cake’s name is misleading. Yes, it’s pumpkin. But it’s not made entirely by dumping, and it’s not really a cake. It’s a bit goopy coming out of the pan.
I couldn’t come up with a better term, however. It’s not a crisp or a crumble. It could be called an upside-down pumpkin pie—but that name doesn’t feel quite right either.
The recipe is worth bothering with, however, because whatever you call it, it’s delicious. I like it MORE than pumpkin pie. I baked it on Mass Appeal last week (along with my favorite meatloaf), and it made everyone there happy.
My extremely autumnal hat also made everyone happy!
Seth couldn’t resist the hat!
The cake mix called for in the recipe is a large one, like King Arthur Flour’s golden vanilla cake mix. If you don’t have that on hand, you may either use a regular smaller cake mix (in which case you’ll want to reduce the amount of butter required in the recipe) or make your own mix with 3-1/4 cups flour, 2 cups sugar, 2-1/2 teaspoons baking powder, and 1 teaspoon salt.
You won’t have any vanilla in the latter combination, but you may add some along with the melted butter—or assume (as I did) that the pumpkin and spices will give the “dump cake” sufficient flavor.
3 eggs
1 12-ounce can evaporated milk
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/4 teaspoon cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 29-ounce can pumpkin (or about 3-1/2 cups)
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1 large box yellow cake mix
1 cup (2 sticks) sweet butter, melted
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and grease a 9-by-13-inch pan. In a large bowl beat the eggs; then beat in the evaporated milk, the spices, the salt, and the pumpkin. Stir in the sugars and blend. Pour the resulting mixture into the prepared pan.
Sprinkle the cake mix over the top and make sure it is fairly even; then drizzle the melted butter over all. Bake until the top is golden brown, about 50 to 60 minutes. Let the cake cool before cutting and serving. Serve with whipped cream.
Serves 12.
Here is the dump-cake video:
And here is the meatloaf video, in which I wax poetic about why I love to cook.
