Pumpkins, They're Not Just for Carving

I know that I have tons of other stuff to post about, and I promise that I will get to it all soon. However, this is easy to share and doesn't require uploading any photos, so I will share it first.

As you know, I make Olivia's food myself. Since pumpkins are seasonal and she really loves them, I bought and made a LOT of pumpkin puree. And since I have so much, I have made a couple of recipes using some of it, like Pumpkin Cranberry Bread. Olivia loves this bread so much that she was trying to pull the plate out of my hands this morning to eat my slice. When I made the hand signal for "all gone" and we had to tell the bread bye-bye, she started crying. It really is that good.

Pumpkin Cranberry Bread

2 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 tbsp. pumpkin pie spice

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

2 eggs

2 cups sugar

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 cup pureed pumpkin (NOT pumpkin pie filling if you're buying the canned stuff)

1 cup chopped fresh cranberries

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour bundt pan.

In a large bowl, combine flour, spice, soda and salt. Mix well and set aside.

In a small bowl, beat eggs until foamy. Beat in sugar, oil, and pumpkin. Add the wet mixture to your dry mixture. Stir until just moistened/combined. Gently fold in cranberries.

Bake for approximately 50 minutes until center is done. Cool for 10 minutes and remove from pan.

The recipe calls for a dusting with powdered sugar, but I didn't do this -- the bread is sweet enough without it. Also, if you want to make your own pumpkin puree, it's super easy:

Pumpkin Puree

You'll need one baking pumpkin (the small ones, not a carving one) and a food processor or blender.

Cut the top/stem off of your pumpkin, then slice the whole thing in half. Empty out the seeds and such. I generally use a paring knife to cut out most of it and then use a grapefruit spoon to scrape out the rest. There will be some stringy stuff left, it's fine.

Once you have two cleaned halves, put them on a baking sheet, face up or down doesn't matter, and put them in a preheated (375 degrees) oven for about an hour. When you take them out and let them cool, you'll be able to peel the rind off of your pumpkin easily with your hands.

Put the meat in a food processor and go to town. You may have to add a few tablespoons of water, depending on the pumpkin. The result should be the consistency of sour cream or slightly runnier.