Pumpkin Bread

I really feel bad for pumpkins.  When autumn comes around, everyone goes into full out pumpkin mode – pumpkin picking, pumpkin pie, pumpkin pancakes, pumpkin cookies, roasted pumpkin, pumpkin lattes, you get the picture.  Once the holidays are over, pumpkin is out.  People turn their backs on pumpkin for the rest of the year and this beautiful, delicious squash is quickly forgotten. 

I like to consider myself an equal opportunity food consumer (technical term), and I try not to pigeonhole foods into a certain time of the year.  I love to make and eat pumpkin anything all year round.  A couple weeks ago I had a strong craving for pumpkin bread.  I decided to go with a recipe I found on Allrecipes.  

Happy Chinese New Year: Bunches of Buns

I’ve been wanting to make Chinese buns (“baozi” in Mandarin) for a while, and what better time to make them than Chinese New Year! Baozi are one of my favorite things that my mom would make for us kids at home, so this was definitely a recipe I wanted to try out on my own. I did most of this based on memory of how my mom used to make hers with the exception of the egg custard filling and crunchy sweet topping recipes.

I made four different kinds: steamed buns filled with ground beef, steamed buns filled with red bean paste, and baked buns filled with egg custard or red bean paste – these are my absolute favorite to get at a Chinese bakery, typically called “pineapple buns” because they have a crunchy sweet topping that makes them look like pineapples.

Sweet Potato Biscuits

One of my absolute favorite foods is sweet potatoes.  Whether I’m at a restaurant or perusing recipes, whenever I stumble upon something with sweet potatoes, I’m instantly sold.  The other day I was trying to be good and went to the gym, only to sit on the bike and read gossip magazines.  I picked up an issue of SELF magazine to read as well, and to my delight, it featured a recipe for sweet potato biscuits!  I was so excited to make these, especially since the recipe is so simple and only needs 5 ingredients – very quick and easy!

The original recipe uses whole wheat biscuit mix as the base – my grocery store didn’t have this, so I settled for Bisquick.  I had to use a bit more Bisquick than the recipe called for in order to get the dough to the right texture, otherwise it was too moist and sticky.  I also altered the cook time to 25 minutes because my biscuits were still raw at the 15 minute mark.  I had to wait a few extra minutes, but boy, these biscuits were well worth the wait!  The recipe makes a total of eight biscuits, and as always, my husband and I always split everything down the middle.  I’m slightly embarrassed to say that I managed to polish off my four biscuits within the same day.  Yes, these biscuits are THAT good.

I'm already drooling

Apple Bread

Yet another recipe passed on from one of my coworkers – apple bread.  I always have Fuji apples at home and all of the other ingredients in this recipe are already in the pantry.  In my opinion, these are the best kinds of recipes because you don’t have to do any extra shopping.  I also got to try out our brand new food processor to chop up all of the apples, yay!

Another amazing thing about this recipe is it makes a TON of bread.  It makes two full loaves, but I opted to make mini apple muffins with the other half of the batter.  I topped them off with some chopped pecans for an added crunch.  As always, I sampled both the loaf and the mini muffins, and both came out so moist and delicious! 

Slices of deliciousness

Bacon Biscuit Stuffing

My wonderful coworkers put together this recipe book for me with their favorite recipes, and there’s one I have been dying to try: Bacon Biscuit Stuffing. What better time than the holidays to give this a shot (though I would be more than happy to eat this all year round).  Honestly, can you really argue with a stuffing that has a buttermilk biscuit base AND bacon? Didn’t think so.  

I went the easy way out and bought two packs of refrigerated biscuit dough for this recipe in lieu of making the biscuits from scratch. 

In an effort to healthify this recipe, I used turkey bacon – obviously, not as good as the real deal, but brings out that nice bacon-y flavor to the dish.  When I pulled the finished product out of the oven, I was so excited to sample it I couldn’t help but dig in right away.  And then I kept going back for more. 

All I have to say is this: try this recipe now! You and your tummy will not regret it.  

Mmm...biscuits