A few fresh treats just for fun!  Hope you all have a Happy Halloween!

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Out of the Box Food Pumpkin Pasties (a la Harry Potter)

Serves: makes approximately 25 Pasties

Special Equipment: 3-4″ cookie/biscuit cutter, parchment paper, 8×8″ square pan, cookie sheet

Ingredients:

• 2 eggs (one for recipe, one for egg wash)
• 1/4 C raw cane, or granulated sugar (see Perfect Pantry Staples)
• 1 C fresh pumpkin (see recipe following), or canned can be substituted
• 1 tbsp butter, melted
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp cloves
• 1/8 tsp nutmeg
• 1/8 tsp ginger
• 1/4 C heavy cream
• 1/4 C half and half
• single pie crust (recipe following), or a natural refrigerated pie crust can be substituted
• 1 tbsp cinnamon sugar

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
• Prepare an 8×8 square pan by greasing with butter or using a non-stick cooking spray.
• Whisk together one egg and sugar.  Add the pumpkin, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and ginger.  Stir in the cream and half and half until smooth.
• Pour pumpkin mixture into prepared dish and bake for 15 minutes.  Reduce heat to 350 degrees and bake for an additional 45 minutes or until a knife inserted into the middle comes out clean.
• Let cool.

Step 2:

• Leave oven heat at 350 degrees.  Prepare cookie sheet with parchment paper.
• Whisk egg with 1 tsp of water to make an egg wash.
• Roll out pie dough very thin.  Using a large round cookie/biscuit cutter (approximately 3-4 inches), cut circles out of dough.
• Spoon approximately 1 tsp pumpkin mixture into center of each dough circle.
• Brush edges of circle with egg wash, and fold over to make a half-moon shape.
• Seal edges with the prongs of a fork.
• Cut a couple of vents into the top of the “pastie” with a sharp knife.
• Brush entire pastie with egg wash and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.
• Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until golden brown.

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For Fresh Pumpkin: (preferably use a small pumpkin specific for cooking labeled “sugar” or “pie” pumpkin.

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Cut pumpkin in half (top of stem to bottom) and scoop out seeds.  (you can rinse off the seeds, toss in olive oil and salt and roast for a delicious snack)
• Place pumpkin halves skin side down in roasting pan and cover.
• Bake for 45 – 75 minutes or until pumpkin flesh is soft.
• Scoop out flesh and puree in food processor until smooth.
• Reserve.

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Whole Wheat & Flax Pie Crust:

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 C whole wheat pastry flour (see Perfect Pantry Staples)
• 2 tbsp flax meal
• 8 tbsp unsalted butter
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 3 tbsp ice water

Directions:

• Place butter in the freezer for about 15 minutes (to make it extra cold).
• Whisk together flour, flax meal and sea salt.
• Cube butter into 1/2″ pieces and add to flour mixture.
• Blend together with pastry cutter, or pulse briefly with food processor until crumbly with small pea-sized pieces of butter ( Do not over mix or crust will not be flaky)
• Drizzle ice water over flour mixture and toss with a fork to combine.  If you can squeeze a small amount of dough and have it stick together, dough is done.  Otherwise, drizzle another teaspoon of ice water over dough.
• Turn dough out onto smooth surface and divide into four pieces.
• Using the heal of your hand, press dough forward a couple times to distribute the fats.  Do not overwork the dough!
• Scrape all dough back together and place on a sheet of plastic wrap.  Press down to form a 4-5″ disk and wrap in plastic wrap.
• Refrigerate at least 1 hour or until ready to use.

*Tip – To easily and efficiently roll out pastry dough: sandwich dough between two sheets of parchment paper.  Roll out dough then remove top layer of parchment.  Leave bottom piece of parchment in place.  From here you can either cut out dough for “pasties” or turnovers OR  if making a pie, lay uncovered side down in pie dish, then remove second piece of parchment.  This technique will save you from both a mess and diminishing the taste of your dough from excess flour, and will help prevent sticking.

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Out of the Box Food Caramel Corn

Special Equipment: Large baking pan, parchment paper, non stick spray.

Serves: lots of hungry ghouls and goblins

Ingredients:

• 1 C raw cane sugar or granulated sugar (see Perfect Pantry Staples)
• 1/4 C agave nectar
• 1 C heavy cream
• 4 tbsp butter
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 10 C popped popcorn (approximately 3/4 C unpopped kernels)

Directions:

Step 1:

• Line baking sheet with parchment and spray with non-stick spray.
• Place cream, sugar and agave in medium (high sided) pot.  Over medium heat, stir with wooden spoon until sugar is dissolved.
• Add butter and bring to a boil.
• When mixture come to a boil, stop stirring and let it boil for 6 minutes.  Mixture will be golden brown.
• Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.  Let cool for 5 minutes.

Step 2:

• Heat oven to 200 degrees.
• Line a large baking sheet with parchment.  Spray with non-stick cooking spray.  Spray two wooden spoons with non-stick cooking spray.
• Pour popcorn onto prepared baking sheet.
• Drizzle warm caramel onto popcorn.
• With prepared spoons, toss popcorn to distribute caramel.
• Place baking sheet in oven and cook for 15 minutes.  Remove from oven and let cool.

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Out of the Box Food Whole Wheat and Flax Pumpkin Waffles

TIME: Prep 10 min
Cook 25 min

SERVES: Makes 12-16 waffles

SUPPLIES:  Belgian Waffle Iron or regular waffle iron

*Tip #1:  For extra fluffy waffles, whip the egg whites separately in a small bowl with whisk before adding to buttermilk mixture.

*Tip #2:  For even quicker preparation next time: pre-mix an extra set of dry ingredients and store in an airtight container or zip closure baggie for the following week.  When you’re ready to make another batch, you’ll just need to add pre-mixed dry ingredients to your wet ingredients and stir to combine.

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 C whole wheat pastry flour (*see Perfect Pantry Staples)
• 1/4 C flax meal (*see Perfect Pantry Staples) optional
• 1/4 C brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp sea salt (*see Perfect Pantry Staples)
• 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp nutmeg
• 1/8 tsp ground cloves
• 1/8 tsp ginger
• 2 C buttermilk (or 1 1/2 C whole milk)
• 2 eggs
• 2 egg whites
• 1 C pumpkin puree (canned or fresh)
• Vegetable oil, butter or non stick spray

Directions:

Step 1 (6 minutes)

• In a large bowl, whisk together flour, flax meal, brown sugar, sea salt, baking powder, baking soda, and spices.
• In a medium bowl, whisk eggs and egg whites.  Add buttermilk (or milk) and pumpkin.
• Add pumpkin mixture to flour mixture and stir JUST until combined. (do not over mix)

Step 2 (time varies according to waffle iron or griddle)

• Heat waffle iron.  Grease or spray with non-stick cooking spray.  Pour batter onto griddle and cook according to your individual waffle iron.
• Serve with melted butter and warm pure maple syrup.

To Freeze:

• Let waffles come to room temperature.
• Place in large freezer bags and freeze.

To Reheat:

• Place frozen waffles in toaster oven and toast until warm and crisp.

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I hope you all have a safe and happy Halloween.  Check back next week when we’ll head into November with a favorite rainy day snack: popcorn.  You won’t believe what we found in those seemingly innocent microwavable bags.  Until next week…