Thanksgiving Desserts

clockwise from top left: Soft Serve Vegan Pumpkin Ice Cream; Whipped Coconut Milk & Pineapple Parfait;
 Moto's Warm Date Cake with Toffee Sauce; Fudgey Made-from-Scratch Brownies

Here are some of my favorite desserts as of late. Some are healthy & some are just deliciously decadent. I think any of these would work for Thanksgiving. What will you be making for dessert tomorrow?

Happy Thanksgiving Eve! Be safe!

Soft Serve Vegan Pumpkin Ice Cream

I had some extra pumpkin in my fridge (after making these pancakes) & was craving something sweet so I made a cross between pumpkin pie filling & ice cream for dessert. Soft serve pumpkin ice cream.

It’s vegan. It’s dairy-free. It's gluten-free. (Read: guilt-free) It’s delish!

It’s a take on my usual go-to frozen banana ice cream trick that I’ve made here & here.

Perfectly Fluffy Pumpkin Spiced Pancakes

This weekend the idea was to carb load so Chris could prepare for the Grete’s Great Gallop Sloan Kettering Half Marathon.  Even though I wasn’t running in the half marathon (I was a great cheerleader instead) I’ve never been one to say no to carbs. So we started our rainy Saturday with pumpkin pancakes. I’m not a huge fan of drinking sweet coffees (sorry for the buzzkill pumpkin spiced latte lovers) but I do love to chew things that taste like pumpkin like pumpkin pie, pumpkin loaf & now these pumpkin pancakes & drink regular flavored coffee with them. I jazzed up this recipe I found with some variations on the ingredients & the great tips I talked about here for making the fluffiest pancakes & the result was carb & flavor-tastic!

How are you celebrating with pumpkin this fall?

Creamy Double Pumpkin Pasta

I made fresh pumpkin pasta that I posted about last week.  My lovely sister-in-laws were quick to ask what I served it with so I'm sharing that today. I served my pumpkin pasta with a pumpkin sauce. More is more, right?

In my mind, pumpkin sauce was the perfect match for pumpkin pasta.  Don't worry the pumpkin flavor is actually pretty mild but still tasty (read: it doesn't overdo it). If you don't have pumpkin pasta I would still recommend making this sauce (then you can call your dish creamy pumpkin pasta). It's creamy & when you add the fresh veggies like I did it's a pretty healthful dish (yes there is some cream & cheese in there but the bulk of it is veggies - so eat up!).

P.S. Happy Halloween!

Fresh Pumpkin Pasta

As soon as it turned October I bought not one but two pumpkins. I had high hopes of making something edible with them. Truth be told only one remains because I lost one to mold.  I'm not really sure what I thought I was going to make with them. Growing up we didn't carve pumpkins - we painted them. In hindsight this was probably a very strategic move for my mother, the mother of some very accident prone children, specifically twins - my sister & I.  Maybe that's why I feel bad about cutting up pumpkins & would rather them rot than be destroyed. It's silly I know but that's why they have canned pumpkin. I have no problem peeling open a can & making recipes with pumpkin that's been neatly stored in a  little can just for me.

That being said, the day I bought the pumpkins, I also bought a can of pumpkin home with me too.  Rather than making the traditional sweet pumpkin pie, I opted to add my canned pumpkin to my go-to pasta recipe. I basically just swapped out half the eggs for the pumpkin.  The result was a vibrant tender pasta with a subtle hint of pumpkin.

Butternut Squash & Pumpkin Soup

I'm no stranger to the Food Network & have spent much couch time taking in the recipes from (my mother-in-law's fave) the Barefoot Contessa.  After watching her make this soup, I needed to make it.  I jazzed it up with some of my own garnishes.  Click through for easy ways to make a new take on a homemade crouton (hint: it's made from corn bread!) & a simple way to make sage fancy.

Oh & a super huge HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Dulcie! Love you little lady! Hope this is the best year yet! XO