Having been assigned to bring a dessert to a luncheon today, I quickly started to explore cookbooks for something pumpkin, since it is officially Pumpkin Month here in Pumpkinville. As I leafed through The Cake Doctor, I came across a Pumpkin spice cake, which I used for the cupcake base (making a few adjustments) and then just added a little cream cheese surprise for the middle, topping it off with cream cheese frosting. The result received many compliments.
Preheat oven to 350.
1 Duncan Hines Yellow or Spice cake mix*See below
1 package (3.4 oz) french vanilla instant pudding mix
1 cup pumpkin, canned puree of pumpkin, not pumpkin mix
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup water
3 large eggs at room temperature
1 teas cinnamon
1/2 teas ground ginger
*because I didn’t have a spice cake mix, I used a yellow one and added an additional 1 teas of pumpkin pie seasoning to the mix, if you use spice cake mix, I would leave this out.
Cream cheese filling
1 8 oz softened cream cheese
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teas vanilla
Frosting
1 (1 lb) box of powdered sugar (equals about 3 1/2 cups)
8 oz (1 stick) softened butter
1 (8 oz) cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup heavy whipping cream (add a little at a time, as it might not need all of this, but might need a little more, depending on how thick you like the frosting.
Cake:
Mix all ingredients together in large mixing bowl and beat for about 2 minutes on medium. Set aside
Cream cheese filling:
Beat softened cream cheese and powdered sugar together and beat until smooth. Add vanilla and mix well. Beat until no more lumps appear.
Place cupcake liners in cupcake pan. Add enough batter to liner to cover bottom. Drop about a tablespoon of cream cheese mixture into middle of the batter. Cover this mixture with more of the pumpkin batter until cupcake holder is about a little more than 1/2 full. Bake in preheated 350 oven until cupcakes test done. About 20 minutes, depending on your oven. I always take mine out when the tops look a little shiny but still feel done to the touch. Let cool and continue using batter and filling until all is used. (You will probably have some of the filling left over, but just keep covered in fridge for another use or you can actually add it to your frosting ingredients, as it is just cream cheese and powdered sugar.)
Frosting
Beat all ingredients until smooth and then frost cooled cupcakes. Keep covered in fridge. Remove from refrigerator about an hour before serving time.
Years ago when I lived in Corpus Christ, TX, one of my favorite dessert memories was from Luby’s Cafeteria. Sometimes, when we would go, they would have a cinnamon apple topped cheesecake. It was delicious and so different from other cheesecakes. Very creamy and the flavor combination of apple, cinnamon with the cream cheese was just awesome. On the back cover of Nov 2016 Taste of Home I found a recipe that resembled that wonderful memory.
It was so much fun to make up a recipe today for our friends coming over tonight from church. I have always wanted to try this and I figured before my first heart attack or before all the butter and cream cheese went to my head and caused dementia, I needed to do this. Just finished putting the final touches on it and I can’t wait until we cut it tonight. Randy and I have set a new world record this week for us. Do not ask me why, but we have not had dessert in 4 nights. I do not count the Hershey with Almonds bar I ate last night as dessert. and..he doesn’t count scraping out the last of the Blue Bell Pumpkin Spice Ice cream out of the container as dessert. Those are just things that we eat to clean up the freezer and cabinets.
We are so excited to have friends coming in from California who have become like family. When we began to plan when they could come, I immediately knew what we would be having for dinner their first night here….chicken fried steak! So after deciding on the main course, and knowing the only things you MUST have with the steak is mashed potatoes, black eyed peas/green beans, we didn’t spend too much time on the side dishes. Looking through different recipes, I remembered that not only is German Chocolate cake is Randy’s favorite cake, it is also one of theirs. So I decided to make one. This one is a little different from the original. Because the homemade cake is so light, it doesn’t hold up well to what I wanted to do, so I used the Betty Crocker, pudding included German Chocolate cake mix and made it in a glass pyrex 9×13. When it was baked and still warm, I poked holes with the handle of a large wooden spoon so the homemade German Chocolate frosting could seep into the cake. This gives the cake such a gooey-gooey texture and allows for the coconut-pecan mixture to ooze through out the entire cake. Then, of course to cover up the holes, what does one do? Well, one makes homemake chocolate frosting to drizzle over the top of that. And to top it off, we will have a side dish of Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla, sitting ever so lovely beside it.
It is still 100 outside, but I cannot wait any longer to begin making pumpkin everything. So today I went looking for a new different recipe for some pumpkin bread and found this one. It sounded so good with the brown sugar streusel that I began to read her blog and knew that this one would be a winner. Since I’m making it for some ladies who I sit with on Tuesday mornings at church, what better way to study Genesis that with a pumpkin muffin? You would love the aroma that is coming out of our kitchen right now. You might just forget that it is hot outside for a few minutes when you smell the pumpkin, cinnamon and cloves drawing you in the door. Taken from the blog called, Friends.Food.Famiy
A few weeks ago I saw these wonderful looking apple pie cups on Facebook and knew right then that I had to have one. As I didn’t have fresh apples in the house and it was still so hot outside that the thought of going outside at 3 p.m. was not enticing. But I did have a can of apple pie filling and a Betty Crocker Oatmeal Cookie packet. So I marched to the kitchen and began to build this great little cup of deliciousness. Having to admit that I did not make the oatmeal cookies from scratch (like I saw on FB), nor using fresh apples, (like I saw on FB), this became a challenge to get a finished product that would certainly be something that I would not apologize for serving, since I was using shortcuts. I have made them twice since Friday. They are that good. A couple that we share baked goods quite frequently, was the first recipeants of these little gems. The wife never got to even taste them as her hubby ate them. So am taking her one today. They will be our dessert tonight at our kids house. Along with ice cream and caramel topping them off.
I love Fridays. It makes me think of what all I want to bake for the weekend and who can I invite to have dinner with us. It is fun to immediately think, “wow, we can watch Netflix until midnight if we want and still sleep in on Saturday and so what do I want to bake for a Republic of Doyle, or Call the Midwife or our new favorite, I’ll Have What Phils Having” marathon?”
Some sweet ladies came to our house for a brunch a couple of weeks ago. Because I had talked about sausage gravy over biscuits at water aerobic class, a couple of the ladies expressed a desire to have some, as they had never experienced this wonderful southern dish. While others in the class are talking about how this class is helping them feel better and building muscle strength, we are at the other end of the pool planning our sausage gravy biscuit brunch. One of the ladies said that she would bring some watermelon so we would have one healthy food item, while yet another said that she would bring a coffee cake. Well, this is the pastry she brought and everyone had a hissy (I’ve been dying to see that word)fit over it. We had such a grand time that morning. The night before, I got this great idea to type out questions to pass around the table and let everyone pick out one a the bowl was passed around. Here are some of the questions that got us talking and getting to know each other a little better. So before I post the recipe a little further down, why not think about having some ladies over that you would like to get to know and use this idea to start the conversation flowing. IT was a really nice morning and we had some really nice memory sharing among us.
Chocolate Castles 