Fall Funtivities: Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

Objective
Satisfy my craving for baked goods. Last night, I was craving something loaded with chocolate, but not just chocolate. I was also craving something thicker than a cookie, but cookie-like. To celebrate the season, I decided on Bake at 350's Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bars.

I made a few changes. First off, I like my bars thick. I doubled the recipe and baked the bars in an 8x8" baking dish. I reduced the sugar, increased the salt and reduced all of the spices (I didn't think pumpkin pie spices and chocolate would taste good together because I'm not a huge fan of chocolate with cinnamon). I added butterscotch chips for added flavor.

Materials
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
scant 1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon of beaten egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup pumpkin puree
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon each ground ginger, nutmeg, cloves
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
semi-sweet chocolate chips & butterscotch chips

Methods
1. Preheat the oven to 350°. Grease an 8x8 inch baking dish and set aside.
2. Beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
3. Beat in the egg and vanilla. Stir in the pumpkin until fully incorporated.
4. Fold in the dry ingredients until just incorporated.
5. Fold in enough chocolate chips to satisfy your chocolate fix.
6. Spread the dough in the prepared baking dish and sprinkle with butterscotch chips.
7. Bake at 350° for about 35 minutes or until the edges are just beginning to brown and a toothpick comes out clean. Cool before cutting.

Results
These are pretty good and did satisfy my craving for baked goods. The flavor is a little weird with chocolate and the pumpkin pie spices. The butterscotch flavor works well with the pumpkin.

Discussion
These bars are OK as is, but could be better. Because the pumpkin pie spices didn't work with chocolate but the butterscotch went well with the bars as a whole, I can see taking this recipe in two completely different directions. Option 1: Omit the pumpkin pie spices all together and increase the amount of butterscotch chips (add some to the dough). Option 2: Increase the pumpkin pie spices and swap the chocolate chips for butterscotch chips.

In the end, I wished I had just made normal chocolate chip cookie bars. But, all is not lost, because I have ideas for how to improve the recipe. I'll be sure to update if I try them again to improve the recipe. What would be even better is if I could convince a friend to try improving it and letting me be the taste tester!

Supplementary Materials

Fall Funtivities: Pumpkin Pie Roll-Out Butter Cookies

It's officially my favorite season! I love Fall because it has the best activities! Apple-picking, bonfires, carving pumpkins, eating pumpkin flavored everything and caramel apples, decorating cut-out Halloween cookies, hiking underneath the leaves that are changing color, costume parties, the list goes on. I spent the past week looking for fall funtivities for my trip to Houston. Apple picking? Nope. Apparently it's too hot in Houston for apple orchards. Pumpkin patch? Nearest one is 50 minutes away (with limited time and a resident's work schedule, that's a little too far). Hikes underneath the changing leaves? Well, we can hike, but I don't think the palm trees will be changing color anytime soon. So, maybe we couldn't fill an entire day with fall funtivities. I knew we needed pumpkins and I knew we needed to bake.

I brought a pie pumpkin to Houston from St. Louis because I got it for $1.50 at the Soulard Farmer's Market. That's only half true. I mostly brought it because I wondered if TSA would actually let me carry-on a pumpkin. They didn't even ask me about it! Thursday night, we picked up more pumpkins from the grocery store and carved 2 of them. The one requirement for pumpkin carving was that we bake the pumpkin seeds. I had the apartment to myself on Friday because the boys had to work. I decided to bake the pumpkin seeds, and since the oven was going to be on anyway, make cookies. While the doctors were away, Abby raided their kitchen to play!

Objective

Make fun fall-cookies with my jack-o-lantern cookie cutter! Scouring the internet for pumpkin roll-out cookies lead me to many recipes with terrible reviews. I decided to make my own version of Pumpkin Spice Roll-out Sugar Cookies from Life's a Batch.

Materials

1 cup unsalted butter, sort of soft (get the chill off)

1 1/4 cup light brown sugar

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon each of ground cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger

1/8 teaspoon each of ground allspice and cloves

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon half-and-half (whatever dairy product you have on hand)

2 3/4 cups all purpose flour

Methods

2. Cream butter and sugar until light (in color) and fluffy. It will be tricky to know when the butter is light because of the brown sugar. However, if you look closely, you'll be able to see that the butter changes from a light yellow to a creamy white. 

3. Stir in the baking powder, salt and spices.

4. Beat in the egg, vanilla and half-and-half.

5. Add in the flour (slowly if you have a hand mixer because it will get thick) and mix until well combined.

6. Divide the dough into 2 or 3 chunks. Place it between 2 sheets of waxed paper and roll the dough to a thickness of 1/8-1/4 inch (depending on if you like them thin and crispy or soft and chewy). Cut out desired shapes with cookie cutters. If you can remove the edges without ruining the cookies, do it. Place the cut out shapes (still on waxed paper and on a hard surface) in the freezer for 5-10 minutes. 

7. Gently transfer the cut-out cookies to a parchment-lined baking sheet. If desired, sprinkle with decorating sugar.

8. Bake 8 minutes at 365°. Let cookies cool on the baking sheet for a few minutes before transferring them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Results

Yum! These are buttery and not overly-sweet. Just enough spice to not be overpowering. The recipe yielded about 40 cookies. 

Discussion

I normally hate making roll-out cookies. It usually becomes one big fat mess and I get frustrated and don't want to finish rolling/cutting them out. These were pretty easy. The butter to flour ratio makes a good, cohesive, soft dough that isn't too tacky. But, be sure to work quickly so that the butter doesn't get too soft. 

If you love cinnamon, add more. If you want a spicy cookie, increase all of the spices by 1/8-1/4 teaspoon. If there's a spice you don't have or don't like, leave it out and add more of the others. I think this is a forgiving recipe when it comes to the spices. If you want to go into a sugar coma, add frosting or glaze. If you're trying to avoid insulin-resistance, don't. These are delicious without frosting!

We took the cookies to a retreat over the weekend and they were a hit. People were really excited when they realized the pumpkins had faces and even more excited when they realized the cookies tasted like pumpkin pie!

Supplementary Materials