A Perfect Taste of Fall

A couple of weeks ago, after making the pumpkin spice cupcakes for my grandpa's birthday, I had some leftover pumpkin that I didn't want to go to waste, and since we were actually having some real fall weather here in Southern California, I figured it was a good time to try my hand at making some seasonally appropriate pumpkin spice cookies.

When I was student teaching last fall, the mom of one of the student's in my 3rd grade class brought in these amazingly delicious pumpkin spice chocolate chip cookies, and I had her email me the recipe because I had to make some for myself. Well, turns out I was way too busy with student teaching and then trying out a bunch of new Christmas cookie recipes to ever get around to making those pumpkin cookies, but here we are, a year later, and I have some time on my hands.

I decided to hunt down a different pumpkin spice chocolate chip cookie recipe to try out; one that was similar to the one the student's mom had given me, but with a few different aspects to it. Here's the link to the site where I got the recipe from:

http://kirbiecravings.com/2009/10/pumpkin-spice-chocolate-chip-cookies.html
Recipe from Deelish Dish
Ingredients
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup canola or corn oil
1 1/2 cups canned pumpkin
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup chocolate chips

1. Position a rack in the middle of the oven. Preheat the oven to
325 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and butter
the paper.
2. Stir the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices together in a medium bowl and set aside.
3. In a large bowl using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat the
eggs and sugar until smooth and lightened in color, about 1 minute.
Stop the mixer and scrape down the sides as needed. On low speed, mix
the oil, pumpkin, and vanilla until blended. Mix the flour mixture to
incorporate it. Stir in the chips by hand.
4. Scoop mounds of the dough onto the prepared baking sheets,
spacing the cookies at least 2 1/2-inches apart. About 1/4-cup per
scoop.
5. Bake the cookies one sheet at a time until the tops feel firm and
a toothpick inserted in the center comes out dry, about 15 minutes. Let
them cool on the sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a rack to
cool completely.



These cookies turned out great; my mom, my sister, and I all loved them. They are definitely a cakier cookie, more like a muffin top than a normal cookie, and honestly would probably be great for breakfast with a nice cup of strong, black coffee :-) And, as always, I doctored up the recipe to make it my own.