Pumpkin Bread

adapted from food.com

Ingredients

• 1 (15 ounce) cans pumpkin puree
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 c vegetable oil and 1/2 c applesauce
• 2/3 cup water
• 3 cups white sugar
• 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• Topping: chopped nuts (walnuts or pecans),  mix with cinnamon and nutmeg

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Grease and flour three 7x3 inch loaf pans.****
3. In a large bowl, mix together pumpkin puree, eggs, oil and applesauce, water and sugar until well blended.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and ginger.
5. Stir the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended.
6. Pour into the prepared pans. Add topping (chopped nuts and spices).
7. Bake for about 50 minutes in the preheated oven.
8. Loaves are done when toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

****I chose to bake 2 ginormous loaves instead - they took 80 minutes to bake. I put foil over the tops at about an hour so the nuts would burn. Definitely would do 3 loaves next time. :) I would also try adding raisins, chocolate chips or nuts to the batter itself! Ooh! Or you could do a glaze for the top! The possibilities are endless.

4 Ingredient Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients:

1 box spice cake mix
1 15 oz can of pumpkin
1/2 cup applesauce
bag of semi sweet chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Mix first three ingredients, then add chocolate chips. Livi and I mixed by hand and it took some work, just so you know! :)
3. Spoon onto greased cookie sheet (about 2 inch clumps, we used our big cereal spoons - or if you have one of those nifty little cookie scoopers, use that!).
4. Bake for 15-17 minutes.

Pumpkin French Toast Bake

Pumpkin French Toast Bake

    recipe taken from: Six Sisters Stuff

Ingredients:

1/2 loaf of French bread cut into 1 inch bread cubes (or about 4 cups crusty bread cut into bite-size pieces) *I used an entire small loaf of french bread, and would have like to have had more, there seemed to be far more gooey than bread! 
8 large eggs *I only had 7, tasted just fine.
1 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
2 tbsp maple syrup
1 tbsp brown sugar
3/4 c pumpkin puree
3-4 tbsp brown sugar for topping
nuts like pecan or walnuts (optional) *I didn't have nuts on hand (unless you count chocolate covered almonds), but I think the crunch would really complement these.

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees (unless you're preparing it the night before).
2. Spray a 9x13 baking dish with cooking spray and place bread cubes in dish (dish should be almost full)
3. In a large bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, vanilla, syrup, 1 tbsp brown sugar, and pumpkin until well combined. 
4. Pour over bread mixture and mix well (large spoon or hands!)
5. Cover with plastic wrap or lid if you're going to refrigerate it overnight, or just pop it in the oven!
6. Bake for 35-45 minutes or until golden brown and no longer wet. *I baked mine for 50 minutes and it was still wet in the middle, we ate around the edges (yum!), but next time I'll add more bread or bake longer.
7. Serve with warm syrup! Yum!