Get Fresh Blog

Ever since beginning the Pumpkin Month tradition, I have wanted to make pumpkin cupcakes. Then at just the right time, along came the book “A Zombie Ate My Cupcake“ by London ex-graphic designer turned cake designer Lily Vanilli. I picked up a copy from Oscar and Libby’s on Fort Street, pouring over all the creatively creepy ideas, as well as doing a Google image search (seriously, take 60 seconds and look… I’ll wait).

While I am not nearly as ambitious as a pro cake designer, I settled on four simple designs to try: zombie brains, mummies, spider webs and pumpkins of course.

Usually I find cupcakes to be a sugar-puff affair, so I opted for a more hearty pumpkin muffin recipe named “The Best Pumpkin Muffins” from super cookbook “Vegan with a Vengeance.” But I added eggs back in and reduced the oil and almond milk. I also reduced the sugar and added an entirely optional 1 cup of chocolate chips. (Cocoa Camino now makes fair trade organic chocolate chips!)

Ingredients: makes 24 muffins

1 Sugar Pie pumpkin (about 2 cups cooked) (* Gobind Farms)
3/4 cup milk (dairy or substitute)
3/4 cup oil (almond or olive)
1 1/2 cups sugar (brown or golden)
4 eggs
4 cups flour (* Island Wheat)
2 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp ground ginger
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Baking Pumpkin Muffins

Mmm... Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Muffins!

(1) Pre-cook pumpkin: cut open top and cut pumpkin in half from top to bottom, scoop out innards, oil cut edges and place cut side down on a baking pan with a 1/4 inch water in the bottom. Roast for 1 hour @ 350F.
(2) Mix Dry Ingredients: Mix flour, baking powder, salt and spices in a large mixing bowl and make a well in the centre.
(3) Blend Wet Ingredients: In a blender or food processor, blend pumpkin pulp (scooped from baked pumpkin half shells) with milk and sugar.
(4) Separately, whisk eggs, then mix in oil and pumpkin mixture.
(5) Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients and mix well. Add chocolate chips (optional)
(6) Bake in lined or oiled muffin tins for 25 minutes at 400F. (Or until lightly golden.) Allow muffins to cool completely before applying icing! Or eat muffins as is warm from the oven to enjoy the oozy chocolatey goodness!

Pretty Please, with Icing On Top

ICING (totally optional) for 12 cupcakes
1/4 cup butter, melted
4 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 cups icing sugar

Whisk together butter, milk and vanilla extract. Gradually add icing sugar as you whisk until icing begins to thicken. Divide into separate bowls to apply coloring. (I would love to say I made my own veggie based colors – the potential of carrot would’ve been interesting.) Melt remaining chocolate chips separately on low heat (or warming plate).

SPIDER WEB: Smoothly and thickly apply melted chocolate over entire muffin top. Pipe thin white/plain icing starting with a thick dot in the middle and two concentric rings around. Use a toothpick and scratch from the centre outwards, visually dividing the top into 6 or 8 parts to create the webbed effect. Refrigerate (the chocolate will form a hard thick shell – delicious!)

ZOMBIE BRAINS: Get the icing good and thick, colored brain-pink. Pipe a thick ribbon onto muffin top in the pattern of a brain, zig-zagging down one half and back the other.

MUMMIES: Pipe two red/pink blobs for eyes, then adhere a chocolate chip into each as a pupil. Pipe white/plain icing in thick flatter ribbons over the top to create the forehead and facial covering.

PUMPKINS: Smoothly apply orange icing. Pipe a thick green stem on top and yellow  for the eyes and mouth. (As you can see, my yellow icing wasn’t thick enough, running down the sides!)

Refrigerate decorated cupcakes.

Spider Web, Zombie Brain, Mummy, Pumpkin Cupcakes

Well folks, this officially concludes Pumpkin Month 2010! Happy Halloween!

Photography and article by Caprina Valentine.

The Weekly Local Challenge is back and continuing Pumpkin Month, this week with those super cute local mini pumpkins I couldn’t resist buying at The Root Cellar. Every year, I’ve eyed this recipe in The Essential Vegetarian Cookbook (Thunderbay Press); now I’m doing it…

INGREDIENTS: 4 mini pumpkins, 2 oz. butter,  3 tbsp flour, 2/3 cup milk, 3 eggs, 1/2 cup grated Mozzarella cheese

Pre-Cook Mini Pumpkins

To make your life easier, you can pre-cook the mini pumpkins a day ahead of time, while you’re doing something else.  I cooked mine while I went out for a walk (someone else was home to make sure the house didn’t burn down).

(1) Preheat your oven to 400F.
(2) Cut open mini pumpkins from the top, like you would a regular Halloween pumpkin… it’s just MINI (so cute!)
(3) Scoop out innards (seeds and strings).
(4) Oil cut side and place open side down in an ovenproof dish.
(5) Add a 1/4-1/2 inch water in the bottom of the dish.
(5) Bake at 400F for 1 hour.

Make the Souffle Filling

(1) Preheat oven to 400F.
(2) Melt butter in a sauce pan on LOW heat.
(3) Meanwhile, separate eggs into yolks and whites. Beat egg whites until foamy and peaks form.
(4) Add milk and flour to melted butter; whisk until thickens and steams.
(5) Meanwhile, gently scoop out pumpkin flesh, leaving a thin shell (cup).
(6) Turn OFF stove top element.
(7) Stir in egg yolk; whisk through.
(8) Stir in grated cheese until thick and creamy… this requires some strong arm action!
(9) Mix in pumpkin until all is creamy and thoroughly mixed.
(10) Fold in foamy egg whites and mix thoroughly.
(11) Fill mini pumpkin “cups”.
(12) Bake for 25 minutes at 400F.

Photography and article by Caprina Valentine.

Another busy week with Thanksgiving holiday and catching up with work. But I will post this photo of some most awesome local mini pumpkins I bought at The Root Cellar. I couldn’t help myself… they are just so cute.

I’m thinking of making pumpkin souffles with them. What do you think?

(They also have mini pumpkins at Abby Lane Farm in Duncan, as I’ve just found out.)

Pumpkin Pie marks the coming of Thanksgiving the same way Egg Nog signals Christmas, and when I saw the pies in the grocery store this year, I thought “$10 for a pie!” But when you buy the pumpkin ($3 at The Root Cellar), eggs, cream, flour, pecans and two hours of electricity to run the oven, $10 is CHEAP! But is it ever different making one from scratch…

My experience with pie making is very limited. I made an apple pie once, for my mother’s birthday, when she visited while I was living in Vancouver at the age of 19. And that’s it. So making this pie was an ambitious endeavour, but I am determined to continue Pumpkin Month, with a Get Fresh Local twist this year, so Pumpkin Pie was it. I found a very in depth recipe and article from the Joy of Cooking (even shares the history of Thanksgiving – worth a read) and decided to give it a go, with some modifications. The resultant recipe and experience are as follows…

Ingredients

Gobind Farms Pumpkin + Island Wheat Flour

PIE CRUST:
1 cup flour (*local: Island Wheat Flour c/o The Root Cellar)
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar (I used golden sugar that I had on hand)
1/2 cup butter, soft (*local: Island Farms)
1/2 cup pecans, crushed

PIE FILLING:
1 Sugar Pie pumpkin, 2 cups cooked (*local: Gobind Farms c/o The Root Cellar)
3 large eggs
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream (*local: Island Farms)
1/2 cup sugar, brown or golden
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger

Day One: Pumpkin Pie Prep

I know I won’t get a full two hours to make this pie, so I divide the tasks over two days. Monday night, while I make dinner – yay for multitasking! – I cook and blend the pumpkin.

1) Cut around the stem (same as for carving) and pull the top off.
2) Cut the pumpkin in half.
3) Scoop out the innards.
4) Oil the edges (where you cut) and place inside down on a baking sheet.
5) Bake in the oven for 60-75 minutes at 350F until soft.
6) Once cooled, scoop flesh from the shell and puree in a blender or food processor.

The next step suggests straining thru a cheesecloth lined strainer to minimize the liquid, but my strainer has tighter holes than cheesecloth, so I just strain it… but I have a little mishap… slooshing a quarter of my pumpkin mush into the sink! Oops, grr… (insert explicative here).

MEANWHILE the pumpkin is cooking, I make the pie dough!

1) Mix flour, salt and sugar in a large bowl.
2) Cut small strips or cubes of butter (1/2 cup’s worth) into the flour mixture.
3) With your finger tips, pinch and knead the butter into the flour (this step would usually be done with a food processor, but I am low tech).
4) Add a tbsp of cold water at a time as you mix the butter with flour until the dough holds together when pinched.
5) Turn the dough onto your work surface and work into a ball.

At this point the instructions tell me to flatten the dough into a disc and let cool in the fridge until use, but I should have skipped that step because it created a mess for me the next day: the dough was stuck (as in couldn’t lever it out with a flipper – or a crowbar for that matter) in the bowl! I solve that one quick by placing it in the warming oven for 5 minutes so the dough became pliable again. Because – duh, I didn’t realize this till now – butter becomes hard when it’s refrigerated! So, I highly recommend that you just skip right to the rolling and/or forming the crust stage! (See more on that below…)

Day Two: Pumpkin Pie Put-Together

Pumpkin Pie Filling

After the pumpkin is cooked and blended, I make the filling Tuesday lunchtime.

1) Whisk 3 eggs.
2) Whisk in 1/2 cup cream.
3) Whisk in spices (you’ll notice I skipped the All Spice)
4) Whisk in the pureed pumpkin.

Rolling the Dough

I fought with this dough… the second challenge comes with rolling… or more accurately… shortly after this photo, I can’t get the dough off the counter top! So I squish it all back into a ball, roll it together a little more, then flatten it into a disc and mush it by hand (and fist) into the pie pan to form the crust. Ah, finally a thing of beauty begins to emerge!

Forming the Crust + Filling the Pie

1) Once you form the pie crust, gently press in a layer of crushed pecans.
2) Fill with the pumpkin-egg-cream filling.
3) Carefully place the pie in the oven on a baking sheet to catch spills.
4) Bake for 55-70 minutes at 375F.

Keep an eye on it! It’s done when the crust browns lightly and most of the top looks set, but a little wet in the centre.

Ta Da! Finished Pumpkin Pie

Finished Pumpkin Pie

When the pie comes out of the oven, I oogle it… I can’t believe I did it. I just sit and stare at it (and grab my camera). I share the pie with my parents, who say, and I quote:

“Well, for the record…” (big pause, me nervously holding my breath) “… that is the best pie I’ve ever had.” – Mum (Wow, thanks Joy of Cooking!)

“There’s not too much spice, but it tastes real nice.” – Dad

And me: I can actually taste the pumpkin… and it’s delicious. And I think, this is what Pumpkin Pie (yes, capitalized) should taste like… FRESH. By the time I write this, the pie has long been enjoyably consumed. I think I’ll make another one and I hope my recipe makes enough sense that you do too. Happy Thanksgiving!

UPDATE Oct 12, 2010: Just brought to my attention that I had missed the 1/2 cup sugar in the pie filling when I had typed this up.  Sorry!