Pumpkin Snickerdoodles (oops)

Pumpkin baked goods two days in a row? It wasn’t supposed to be, but after Samantha tweeted a question about my mistake (she called me a tease!) , I figured it would just be cruel to hold out on you.

For those of you subscribed to receive my posts delivered to your inbox, you likely received a very incomplete post for Pumpkin Snickerdoodles sometime yesterday afternoon. My mistake. I hit “Publish” when I should have hit “Save Draft”. Sorry! So, to clear up any confusion, that is my story and I’m sticking to it.

Tomorrow we will have to get down to business and bust out something healthy. Between yesterday’s and today’s posts I wouldn’t want anyone getting the wrong idea about what I stand for…moderation, that is 😉

These Pumpkin Snickerdoodles were made for Mid Ohio Nutrition Specialists’ Open House today! We have no idea how many medical professionals to expect, so I wanted to make a recipe that would be sure to feed a crowd. I had pondered the idea of an apple cupcake, but without any way to transport them all, I decided on cookies. And what a perfect cookie for these cooler fall days and the quickly approaching October holiday of Halloween. But I won’t try to make excuses…there’s never enough reasons in my mind to enjoy something with pumpkin!

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Pumpkin Snickerdoodles originally from Recipe Girl, adapted from Stick A Fork In It

Cookies:
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups granulated white sugar
1 cup pure unsweetened pumpkin puree
1 large egg
2 tsp vanilla extract
3 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Rolling sugar:
1/2 cup granulated white sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp allspice

Directions:

In a large bowl, use an electric mixer to cream the butter until fluffy. Add sugar and pumpkin puree and beat well. Mix in egg and vanilla, scraping down sides of the bowl to incorporate all of the ingredients.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and ground cinnamon. Beat flour mixture into liquid mixture a little at a time just until incorporated.

Cover dough with plastic and chill at least an hour, or until dough becomes slightly firm.

When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper (or spray with nonstick spray). Mix rolling sugar ingredients in a small bowl.

Remove cookie dough from refrigerator. Use a medium cookie scoop (1 1/2 tablespoons) or a large spoon to scoop out dough and roll into balls. Use your hands to roll the balls in the cinnamon sugar and make sure they are coated really well. Place 2 inches apart on the prepared baking sheets. Use a glass with a nice, flat bottom to dip in sugar and flatten the balls.

Bake at 350 F. for 10 to 14 minutes, or until they are slightly firm to the touch. Let cool on baking sheets for 5 minutes or so, then remove them to a wire rack to cool completely. Yield: 4 dozen cookies.

Nutrition Information (per cookie): 98 calories; 3.8 g. fat; 5 mg. cholesterol; 41 mg. sodium; 15.3 g. carbohydrate; 0.2 g. fiber; 1.1 g. protein

Result: They are like having Christmas in September! Any recipe that starts with 2 sticks of butter, sugar, and pumpkin is bound to be good. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the cookies came in under 100 calories each 🙂 Enjoy!

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Off to a meeting, our open house, over to the clinic for a bit, and then off to teach. Thanks for the pushes to workout last night on Facebook. There’s no time today for a workout so I’m very glad I squeezed it in last night…as usual, you guys were right 😉

Question: What’s your favorite pumpkin recipe?

Be well,