I don’t bake very often. I like baking. In fact it used to be one of my favorite things to do when I was stressed. But I found that stress eating and stress baking were going hand in hand. So I decided that perhaps I should try different ways to manage my stress and bake a little less. It didn’t hurt that around the same time the oven at our rental unit was broken (I could use the stove and broil things, but not bake) so I couldn’t bake even if I wanted to.
Baking can be so great to do with kids though. You don’t tend to need much in the way of sharp implements and the heat is all at the end. I love ginger and I had some left over canned pumpkin from the holidays so when I found this recipe from the food blog Simply Recipes, I was sure I had found a winner.
Gordie loved them! I made them into mini-muffins because they are easier for little hands to hold. The pumpkin provides some good nutrients, but I wanted to see if they’d still be good if I used whole wheat flour. They weren’t quite as light as the white flour ones (or as pretty) but they were good and Gordie loved them just as much.
- 1½ cups whole wheat flour
- ½ teaspoon salt1 cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 cup pumpkin pure
- ⅓ cup melted butter
- 2 eggs beaten
- ⅓ cup water
- ½ tsp nutmeg
- ½ tsp cinnamon
- ½ tsp allspice
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- ½ cup chopped pecans
- ¼ cup chopped candied ginger (I like them roughly chopped but most kids will probably like them better if they’re pretty finely chopped).
- Preheat oven to 350F.
- Mix dry ingredients (flour, salt, sugar, baking soda, spices) in a large bowl.
- Beat eggs in a bowl and then add the wet ingredients (pumpkin, melted butter, water).
- Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix with a fork. (I love how recipes say “do not over-mix” without over explaining what that means. I try to stop right after there isn’t any visible dry flour).
- Spoon into the mini-muffin cups (using my non-stick muffin tray I find it’s actually better not to grease the pan) and bake for 17-22 minutes. Test a muffin with a toothpick. If it does not come out clean, bake for a couple more minutes and retest.
- Makes about 24 mini-muffins.
I will have to give these a try. I made Killer Pumpkin Muffins from The Crabby Cookbook and they were delicious. Finley went crazy for them which is good because they were sugar free and super healthy. I will have to blog the recipe! Thanks for sharing!