Happy Fall: 5 Favorite Pumpkin Recipes

Happy first day of fall! To celebrate this amazing season I'm sharing five of my favorite pumpkin recipes!

one. No surprise here - Pumpkin Dip coming in at #1! This pumpkin recipe is one of my top blog posts of ALL TIME with more than 370,000 page views! It is SO good though and is definitely a crowd pleaser. Make it ASAP! 

 

two. Easy Pumpkin Bread. So this recipe is so dang fantastic because it calls for TWO ingredients.

three.  Pumpkin Spice Muddy Buddies. My kids flip when I make these. And I kind of do too. This festive twist on muddy buddies makes this snack perfect for fall!

four.  Roasted Pumpkin Seeds. Don't toss your seeds this year while carving your pumpkins!

five. Sparkling Pumpkin Beertail. A boozy finale to my round up, this cocktail contains all the best flavors of fall.

What is your favorite pumpkin recipe? 

 

Pineapple Lemon Cupcakes {Cream Cheese Frosting}

My newest pregnancy craving is pineapple! I just can't get enough. Dried, fresh or juice, I love it all. This week I took down two whole pineapples on my own, which somewhat worries me because pineapple is also known to naturally induce labor - yikes.

Anyway, I have an easy pineapple dessert for y'all today - Pineapple Lemon Cupcakes!

And it all starts from a box of lemon supreme cake mix! To incorporate the pineapple flavor just substitute pineapple juice in place of water and bake your cake according to the directions. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy!

Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients:
- 16 ounces cream cheese (room temp.)
- 2 sticks unsalted butter  - 2 cups confectioners sugar
-  2 tsp vanilla extract - 2 tsp heavy whipping cream

Directions:
    In a medium mixing bowl, combine your cream cheese and butter, mixing until incorporated. Sift in the sugar, and continue mixing. Stir in vanilla and mix until smooth. Pour in your whipping cream and mix on high until fluffy. 
Yield: 4 cups (easily halved or quartered)

Valentine Cookies {with Royal Icing}

After reading through many recipes claiming to be the "best sugar cookie EVER" on Pinterest I decided to try two of the most convincing ones out yesterday. More than likely it was an error on my part but I ended up with two batches of terrible cookies. I was pretty disappointed since both recipes took so much work, wasted lots of ingredients and I so badly wanted a Valentine themed treat.

Anyway, I had promised to bring a dessert to bible study last night so I knew I couldn't come empty handed. In a last desperate attempt I whipped up one more batch of cookies and although they weren't my best {Matt gives very honest reviews}, the icing sure did make them tasty and they were too pretty not to share!

We are currently studying Tim Keller's book "The Meaning of Marriage" in our couples bible study so I thought it would be clever to bring heart shaped cookies.

 This was my first time experimenting with Royal Icing and I am definitely a fan, even though it requires a lot of time.

Best Sugar Cookie Recipe From In Katrina's Kitchen
  Ingredients:
1 Cup butter, softened
1 Cup granulated white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 egg
2 teaspoons baking powder
3 cups all purpose flour
  Directions:
    Preheat oven to 350° F. In the bowl of your mixer cream butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in extracts and eggs. In a separate bowl combine baking powder with flour and add a little at a time to the wet ingredients. The dough will be very stiff. If it becomes too stiff for your mixer turn out the dough onto a countertop surface. Wet your hands and finish off kneading the dough by hand. DO NOT CHILL THE DOUGH. Divide into workable batches, roll out onto a floured surface and cut. You want these cookies to be on the thicker side (closer to 1/4 inch rather than 1/8). Bake at 350 for 6-8 minutes. Let cool on the cookie sheet until firm enough to transfer to a cooling rack.   Royal Icing 4 cups Domino Powdered Sugar 4 TBS Wilton's Meringue Powder Wilton's Gel Food Coloring 4 TBS Water initially, plus additional while mixing Spray bottle {optional}   Basically use 1 cup of powdered sugar for every 1 TBS of meringue powder with warm water mixed SLOWLY in until desired consistency.      If you're going to attempt Royal Icing, I highly recommend using Make Bake Celebrate's Royal Icing 101 Tutorial {found here}. It's the best one I found and she is very thorough with her instructions! 

You can't go wrong with sprinkles so I loaded my cookies up before my icing dried. I was also pretty excited to break out my Heart Side-of-the-Cup cookie cutter from World Market that's been sitting in my kitchen drawer for almost a year. Love it? You can find it {here} for only $1.29!   Are you planning to make any festive Valentine treats this year? Oh, and if you have an amazing tried and true sugar cookie recipe, feel free to pass it on!

Oreo Snowman Pops

Just popping in to share my Oreo Snowman Pops from the Christmas Cookie Exchange last weekend!

Once I got tired of making snowmen, I decided to decorate the rest of the cookies with some classic red sprinkles!

Dunkaroo Dip: A Lunchbox Snack Throwback

Recently I have been dying to go back to my 3rd grade snack days with some good old dunkaroo dip! Rivaling Gushers and the chocolate filled koalas, Dunkaroos were definitely a top 5 elementary school lunchbox snack. Oh the cafeteria memories!

 I quickly found the perfect opportunity to make this over the weekend for a birthday party we were invited to. Accompanying our delicious dunking snack? Animal cookies and lots of fruit {not pictured}.

Dunkaroo Dip

1 box (18 oz) Funfetti cake mix
1 1/2 cup plain or vanilla yogurt
2 cups Cool Whip 1 tsp vanilla extract

Mix all ingredients together in a bowl until completely combined and there are no more lumps. Chill in refrigerator for one hour (keeps up to three days or can be frozen).  Serve with animal crackers, teddy grahams/graham crackers, or Nilla Wafers for an easy dessert.    Note: You can also substitute fat-free Cool Whip and/or yogurt for lower calories.

I added lots of additional sprinkles. After all, it was a birthday celebration we were going to.

Unlike the original Dunkaroos, I ensured there was a more fair ratio of frosting to cookies. There is nothing more frustrating than running out of frosting with a full plate of cookies! What was your favorite lunchbox snack?