As Promised, Or: How Pumpkin Trumped Turkey

So last night, we went to a friend's party in which the theme was Pumpkin vs Turkey.  Mostly the women brought pumpkin dishes (and the hostess made a whole slew of yummy stuff that wasn't all pumpkin themed) and the men fried a couple of turkeys.  Yes, a couple.  It was a lot of bird.  My contribution to this disaster was inspired by the fact that my man is a Vermont boy through and through, and believes everything is better with maple syrup.  He's not wrong.  However, none of this imitation crap will fly with him, so the majority of the morning was spent chasing down the elusive Maple Extract.  In the end, I wound up with Maple Flavoring, and he just had to deal.

Oh right, I should tell you what I made.

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies with Maple Filling. 

They were a hit.
The adventure started out as usual, with the counter filled with crap and waiting to be trashed.

 I didn't have ground cloves, so I had to use this sweet mortar and pistil my brother got me for Christmas a few years back.  I rarely get to use it, but I love it when I do.  I also love the smell of freshly ground cloves, so this was a major win. 

 I swear, I'll never mix anything by hand again.  This thing worked like a dream.

 This is what the batter looked like when everything was mixed in.  Nothing too special.  I didn't chill it for an hour, I put it in the freezer for 15 minutes.  Worked fine for me, but I'm sure purists would cringe.  Oh well.

 Oh right.  This was the point at which I realized what Nick had up on his wall (a handy dispenser) was not, in fact, parchment paper, but was instead wax paper.  Why I thought a bachelor (he'd had that up since before me) would ever buy (let alone use) parchment paper is beyond me.  I learned in the nick of time that wax paper is NOT good in the oven (it smoked a lot) and I traded it in for foil, which worked fine.

 The first batch fresh out of the oven.  Yumm. 

 There wasn't as much filling as I guess I expected, but apparently that was a good thing.  The cookies weren't savory by any means, but the filling was REALLY sweet, and you don't need much of it for it to turn to overkill in a flash. 

 The first heap, done.

 The final heap.  Don't they look delish?  By the end of the night, only four remained.  Three were called "breakfast" and met their fate this morning.

 My ever-fearless taste tester trying one out before I let them out into the public.  I think that's his yummy face.  Maybe. 

A "whoopie pie connoisseur" at the party even deemed them yummy, so I'd count that as a success.

This coming week is Argentina week.  I'll post later today (I hope) with recipes for the week and with a couple of book mentions.  Now, I have chores to do.


Whoopie Pie