yummmmm...

...today I baked. A bunch. Michelle (Drew's sister that lives in the same apartment complex as us) gave me a can of pumpkin last week because she got a whole mess of them super cheap or free or something, and I used a tiny bit for pumpkin bread in my new-to-me bread machine. Then I had almost a whole can to use up.

I made some pumpkin scones and pumpkin cookies. I had been wanting to try out the pumpkin scone recipe since I saw it in a magazine last fall. I had been waiting because it calls for chili oil (popular in Asian dishes) and that's not something usually found in our pantry! So, I made some chili oil! I'm glad I made it myself and didn't spend however much it was at the grocery store-outrageous amount, probably.

Chili oil is just an oil that's been infused with chili peppers, jalepenos or some other spicy pepper. Usually this is done by letting the peppers (fresh or dried) steep in the oil for a few weeks. Well, I didn't have a few weeks or a few fresh or dried chili peppers! For my homemade oil, I just put 1/2 cup vegetable oil and 1 teaspoon each of crushed red pepper and chili powder into a small saucepan and warmed it on low on the stove until I could smell the chilis. Now it's in the fridge, I probably won't be using it again anytime soon...I'll have to make some homemade stir fry or something! ;)

At any rate, it's a savory scone, which also made it intriguing, because I make a mean sweet orange scone. It's just too bad that it didn't turn out exactly as I would have liked. And I used the last of my nutmeg. I don't know if I put too much chili oil in it or what, but the pumpkin flavor didn't come through and left an odd spicy aftertaste. Not odd enough that it wasn't edible, mind you. Margarine makes everything better. ;)

Before I screwed those up, I made a batch of pumpkin cookies, from the Libby's recipe that I got straight off the can of pumpkin. These are always a treat! I ended up using the rest of my vanilla, so I couldn't make the icing these cookie require. Drew said I should just use another extract, but I only have anise, mint and orange. I tried mint icing and Drew ate one of the cookies, but I thought it overpowered the pumpkin cookie. Instead, I gently heated up some canned cream cheese frosting until it was just runny, dipped the cookies and called it a day in the kitchen!

And, I still have some pumpkin left in the fridge!

(I'll post these recipes over on the recipe tab [at the top] in case anyone else wants to try them out!)