Pumpkin Mug Brownie

Have you been sensing a theme this week?  I've been obsessed with pumpkin lately.  Don't be surprised if you're seeing all kinds of pumpkin recipes well into December.

 Now that you've been warned, let's discuss today's featured recipe: Microwaveable Pumpkin Brownies for Two from Oh My Veggies.

This is an adaptation from what I consider to be the original mug cake.  This version uses milk instead of water, and pumpkin instead of oil.

This brownie is very rich. I strongly suggest that you find someone to share this bad boy with so you don't give yourself a tummy ache.

I think I will do some experimenting to see if I can cut down the amount of sugar in this recipe. Towards the end of the dessert, I began to feel overwhelmed by the sweetness of the dessert.  I'm sure Blockette will be my eager helper in test tasting my future experiments!

 Vegan Pumpkin Mug Brownie from Oh My Veggies
1/4 c. sugar
1/4 c. flour
2 T. unsweetened cocoa powder
2 T pumpkin puree
2 T. non-dairy milk (I used skim milk)
1 T. chocolate chips
1/2 t. pumpkin pie spice
a pinch of salt

Stir together all ingredients in a latte mug or small bowl. (This mug cake does not rise much so a large mug is not necessary.) Microwave for 1 minute; continue to microwave at 15 second intervals until top of brownie is dry. 

Pumpkin Sloppy joes

I made these Pumpkin sloppy joes from Taste of Home for the first time back in 2008.  I had been doing my weekly meal planning, which included Garlic Pork Fried Rice.  The recipe for Pumpkin sloppy joes just happened to be printed on the same page as the fried rice. 

This version of sloppy joes is a nice change from the basic Manwich.  Although, if you are sensitive, you might be able to taste the pumpkin.  Blockette said she could, but she thought it was great. 

I like to add 1/2-1 t cumin to our version.  It adds a little bit more smoky flavor.  If we were all fans of things with a little heat, I'd add some chipotle powder as well.

My sloppy joe mix was a bit on the thick side so I added some water.  Be very careful when you do this because I went a bit too far in the other direction, adding too much water.  This just made our joes extra sloppy.  I could have let it simmer for longer to let more of the water evaporate, but I was too lazy and hungry to do that.

 Pumpkin Sloppy Joes from Taste of Home

1 pound ground beef or turkey

1/2 cup chopped onion

1 garlic clove, minced

1 cup canned pumpkin

1 can (8 ounces) tomato sauce

2 tablespoons brown sugar

2 tablespoons prepared mustard

2 teaspoons chili powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

In a large skillet, cook beef, onion and garlic over medium heat until meat is no longer pink; drain. Stir in the pumpkin, tomato sauce, brown sugar, mustard, chili powder and salt. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, for 10 minutes.  Serve on buns as you would good old Sloppy joes.  I like mine with cheddar and lots of dill pickles!

Pumpkin Cornbread

 These pumpkin cornbread from Sweet Peas Kitchen were amazing!  They are slightly sweet version of cornbread.  I couldn't taste the pumpkin itself, but the molasses, nutmeg and cinnamon make the cornbread smell like Autumn.

I served these along side this chili.  I made one small change to the chili recipe though.  I added a cup of pumpkin!  With all the flavors in that chili, no one was the wiser.  Hooray!  Extra veggies for everyone.

I was surprised that this cornbread recipe resulted in a dry crumbly sort of cornbread.  Usually when I bake with something like pumpkin, the resulting food product is super moist.  I wasn't upset that the cornbread was on the crumbly side, it was just unexpected.  Crumbly is actually good when you're dunking it in chili. Then all the little bits fall in the chili...yum!

This recipe will get made again for sure, and not just as a side to chili.  I'd totally make these for breakfast, they were that tasty!

One more thing.  You can totally make this recipe in a 8x8 pan.  I prefer cornbread in muffin form, so that's what I went with.  Muffins are easier to portion out, as I cannot cut a straight line.  Someone always complains that they got the "small" piece.  With muffins, I just use a large cookie scoop of batter per muffin cup and everything is nice an equal.  I've also found that muffins are easier for Mrblocko to transport to work than the sliced counterparts. 

This recipe does make 12 muffins.  Gnomes snatched a cornbread muffin before I could take a picture. 

Trixie little gnomes.

Pumpkin Cornbread from Sweet Pea's Kitchen
1c flour
1 T baking powder
1 t kosher salt
1/2 t cinnamon
1/4 t t nutmeg
1/2 ct brown sugar
1 c cornmeal
2 eggs
1 c pumpkin puree
1/4 c olive oil (I used canola)
1 T molasses

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Grease an 8×8″ cake pan. (or line 12 muffin cups)  In a medium bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, salt, spices, brown sugar, and cornmeal; set aside. In a large bowl, lightly beat the eggs, and then stir in pumpkin, oil, and molasses. Stir wet ingredients into dry ingredients just until combined, and then pour batter into pan, smoothing the top. (or use a large cookie scoop to portion out batter for muffins.) Bake 25-30 (10-15 for muffins) minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Pinterest Fact or Fiction: Oven Door

Today we are going to discus the tip of Cleaning the oven door from DIY Home Sweet Home.

The trick is to make a baking soda paste, and apply it to your oven door.  Then you let the baking soda marinate for 20 min.  When you scrub the stuff off, Shazam!  The oven door is magically super sparkly clean.

Let's take a look at my oven door before I started: 

Ew.

Notice my little helper at the bottom left hand portion of the photo.

Apparently, open ovens, particularly those coated in baking soda are fascinating to little black cats.  Playing keep away from the oven for 20 min is not my idea of good times.

Now after I had all that fun, I got to scrub the gunk off the door.

Aaaaaand then the oven door looked like this:

Hmm.

I included the paper towels I used to clean the oven in the photo 1.) so you could see that some of the dirt DID actually come off, and 2.) so I could tell the before and after photos apart in my camera.

Let's do a side by side comparison:

People swear this works.  It didn't work on my industrial strength super Hulking dirt. 

I'm marking this one down as Pinterest Fiction.

From now on I'll just stick with the self cleaning mode on the oven. 

Thankful Thurs #47 Thanksgiving Edition!

This Thankful Thursday I thought I'd switch up a bit for Thanksgiving.  Instead of writing a list of things I'm thankful for, I thought I'd share with you some of the more interesting things Blockette has thanked God for in the past few weeks.

source

1. Aliens

2. Portals

3. Other Dimensions

4. Mummies

5. Computer Games

6. Electronics

7.The continent

8. The planet

9. The galaxy

10. The universe

Beer Flat Bread

 I was making beer french fries, which seems to be the only fries we like to eat lately, and I kept thinking, "It's a shame I have to toss the beer that the potatoes have been soaking in."

Wasn't there something I could make with the extra starchy potato-y beer?

Of course there was, but would it turn out?

I decided to make Crispy Beer Flatbread from Yummly.

The verdict was...
Meh.

The bread got chewy instead of crispy, and never really browned up properly. Strangely, it was better the second day when I nuked a slice for 10 seconds, wrapped in a paper towel.

I have no plans to make this again, but it was definitely an interesting experiment.

If you'd like to make this bread, don't use the leftover beer that your potato fries have been soaking in and I'm sure yours will turn out lovely.

Beer Flatbread from Yummly
2 cups all-purpose flour 
1 tsp salt 
3/4 cup beer 
3 tbsps olive oil 
1 clove garlic (crushed) 
1 tbsp herbs (dried thyme, rosemary, oregano, and/or marjoram)

Preheat oven to 400. Put the baking tray into the oven. So it will be hot as well. Mix olive oil and garlic and set aside.  Mix flour with salt and add beer. Mix with hands until dough is formed. Knead dough 5 min with slightly floured hands. Let rest dough 10 min. Stretch out dough onto parchment paper the size of baking sheet.  Brush with oil and herbs.  Put parchment on tray and bake 5-10 min (I baked mine for 20 and it still didn't get brown on top.)  Bread should get brown and bubbly on top!
 

Maple Chicken with Onions and Apples

I saw a version of this recipe for Maple apple chicken from Eat At Home.  The recipe from Eat At Home was adapted for the crockpot.  Sometimes the crockpot is great, but this particular night was a rarity where I didn't have time to prepare dinner ahead of time.  So just made it in the skillet.

I did a bit of research and found that original recipe is from Kraft.  That one seemed the easiest.  Of
course if you are opposed to bottled Italian dressing, you could follow this recipe from Cookin a blue streak that uses thyme, sage, cider vinegar and chicken stock.  I, however, am most certainly not opposed to bottled dressing!

This recipe was a huge success!

I was a bit leery about the onions.  We are used to eating caramelized onions.  I suppose I could have caramelized the onions, but I was short on time.  They turned out great even though they weren't caramelized.  Somehow they combine with the sweet from the apples and maple and the tang from the salad dressing.  It sounds weird, but it's a nicely balanced combo.

The leftovers were just as tasty.  We ate them cold, over warm rice.

Blockette wanted me to tell you that this dish was so awesome, it's right behind Beefaroni on the delicious scale.

Maple Baked Apple Chicken from Kraft
4 chicken breasts
1/2 c sliced onions ( I used 2 small onions)
3 apples (I used 4 small apples: 2 jonagold and 2 gala) - sliced thin
1/2 c pancake or maple syrup (I used homemade syrup)
1/3 c Italian Dressing


Heat oven to 350°F. Spray large ovenproof nonstick skillet with cooking spray. Heat on medi-high heat. Add chicken; cook 3 min. on each side or until lightly browned on both sides. Remove from heat.  Place onions on top of chicken; surround with apple slices. Mix syrup and dressing; pour over chicken.  Bake 20-25 min. or until chicken is cooked through (165ºF). Spoon syrup mixture in skillet over chicken just before serving.