(This post is a look into the inner workings of Kimara. Avert your eyes if you are squemish.) So, we all know about my hour long phone call yesterday, and how it turned in a bit of a paint debacle, which proceed into some colorful doodling, which, given the fact that it could, resulted in a blog. With me so far? Okay, so Hootie comments saying the 5 pumpkins on the wall reminded her of her MIL because she was a preschool teacher and use to do this poem all the time. Which, because I lead a very small life, tickles me senseless, because being an ex-preschool teacher, that’s exactly what I was thinking about when I lined up those 5 pumpkins. Which, naturally made me want to share the poem, so I popped on FaceBook and posted the poem… which was received quite well I may add. Okay, so a paint spill now becomes two different postings. So… there’s always a so, isn’t there… sooooo…. I’m sitting there this afternoon thinking about the pumpkin thumbprints, which gets me to thinking about our Christmas Thumbprint cookies, which makes me think that there is no reason in this entire world why I shouldn’t make of batch of Pumpkin Thumbprint Cookies to go along with… you guessed it… a doodle.
Now, it’s not like I don’t have anything else to do, but I want Pumpkin Thumbprint Cookies… nay, I MUST have Pumpkin Thumbprint Cookies to blog about. I decide I can put everything else on the back burner for a couple hours. So, I start playing with a few recipes, combining this, deleting that, adding a little more of this, until wah-lah… Pumpkin Thumbprint Cookies. I must admit the recipe kinda morphed as I was making it BUT I just had a completed cookie, not to mention the fact that I was already on an unnatural sugar high from licking my fingers, which will go a long way to explaining the content of this blog, but I had a Pumpkin Thumbprint Cookie and it was delicious. If you like pumpkin… if you like cheese cake… you are going to be in heaven when you taste one. Besides, they are so darn cute, even if they tasted like spinach that had turned orange, (and I’ve seen that happen) they would be worth making just to look at. So… this was my introduction, into what I think will become, one of my Favorite Fall Recipes! (BTW… the napkin in covering the plate is one of my Rip and Tear Halloween Napkins.)
PUMPKIN THUMBPRINT COOKIES
Ingredients
Cookie:
1 cup canned pumpkin
3/4 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup apple sauce
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 1/4 cup oatmeal
2 1/4 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1 tablespoon cinnamon
optional 1/2 – 1 cup butterscotch chips (if you add chips omit the 1/2 cups white sugar)
Frosting:
1 – 8 ounce package of cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup butter, softened
4 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla
optional – if you want to make pumpkins, enough orange food coloring to make a deep orange
optional – butterscotch chips for stems
Directions
Mix pumpkin, sugars, vanilla and applesauce. In a separate bowl, mix dry ingredients together. Add dry ingredients to applesauce mixture. If adding butterscotch chips, mix them in now.
Drop tablespoon of dough on cookie sheet, leaving 2″ between cookies. (I love to use cookie scoops!) Depress your thumb into the middle of the cookie. If you thumb is sticking to the cookie dough, dip it in flour first.
Bake at 350 degrees for about 10 minute (until brown). Allow the cookies to cool completely before frosting.
To make frosting, cream all ingredients, except butterscotch chips. For regular cookies, spoon frosting into your thumb’s indentation. If making the pumpkins, use a cookie scoop, and mound the frosting on each cookie. Top with a butterscotch chip for a stem.
Recipe makes 5 dozen cookies. If you are making pumpkins on top of the cookies, you will only have enough frosting for 3 1/2 dozen cookies.
Note: Since there is cream cheese in the frosting, I would refrigerate until time to serve.
I used a recipe found at http://www.grouprecipes.com/24254/pumpkin-oatmeal-thumbprint-cookies.html as the starting point. Check out her original version.
And this folks is why she leaves half of her comments in real life unfinished… because her brain has already moved on somewhere else and the rest of us are in a scramble to keep up. Of course I "Speak" Kimara and am usually right there with her but the men in our lives… well, they are often apt to raise their eyebrows and look around wondering if anyone followed the Kimara train. It’s hard to do folks… since Kimara doesn’t run on a track. But don’t worry, if you missed it. She will get back to it some point, when you least expect it… the queen of non sequiturs.
The cookies do sound delicous but many a tad too much topping for me. They do look at cute as pumpkins though. If I had somewhere special to bring them I would but otherwise I would ommit the food coloring and use the right amount of frosting. A friend just put up pumpkin. It would be a great time to give it a go. And you two sound so jolly. It’s nice to have a mum and daughter so close.
Wow! A lot can happen in 24 hours in your neck of the woods! I haven’t even had a chance to gather my paints to make a card yet for my MIL (who lives next door to me!). I am definitely going to have to try those cookies. They do look great and based on the ingredients are sure to taste great too. I find it comforting that your daughter speaks your language! 🙂
So delicious looking! I’m drooling at the ingredients mentioned!