A Family’s Fall Favorite: Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

There are many things to love about Fall – brisk air, bright leaves, and warm sweaters. One of my favorite, yet maybe the most overlooked, things about Fall, is the food that surrounds it. Most families welcome the fall months with a Thanksgiving staple – pumpkin pie.

However, my family has made it tradition to include desserts that exhibit the same fall flavors, such as cinnamon and pumpkin, without succumbing to the norm of Thanksgiving. My favorite of these treats are my mom’s Pumpkin Whoopie Pies.

Whoopie pies are sandwich cookies made with a homemade cake mix, then filled with frosting. They’re easy to make and can be made with virtually any flavor combination. Below is my family’s recipe for the Pumpkin flavor.

You’ll need: All-purpose flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ground ginger, salt, brown sugar, vanilla extract, eggs, canned pumpkin, and butter/margarine.

 

As far as equipment goes, you’ll need a stand mixer, a rubber spatula, a spoon, a teaspoon, a 1 cup measuring cup, cooking spray/ parchment paper, baking sheets, and cooling racks.

 

 

First, make sure your butter is softened (if you don’t have time, microwave it for ten seconds), and add two sticks of it to the mixer

Then, add two cups of brown sugar. Make sure you pack it as tight as possible into the measuring cup, or the cake will turn out surprisingly bitter.

Mix them on high power until light and fluffy. This will take awhile, so don’t worry if it doesn’t seem like it’s coming together.

To help the process go faster, turn your mixer off and push the sugar on the sides down into the bowl, then resume mixing.

The end result should look like fine, wet sand.

Next, add your eggs one at a time, beating in between each egg.

Add one teaspoon (or more, depending on your taste) of vanilla extract, then mix well.  

In a separate bowl, add two cups of flour.

Add one teaspoon of baking soda, then one teaspoon of baking powder.

Then add some salt.

Then, according to taste, add cinnamon.

 And follow up with a teaspoon of ground ginger.

Mix this all together with a fork, until well-combined.

Open your can of pumpkin..

Then return to your mixer and add about ⅓ of the flour mixture to the egg/butter/sugar mixture.

Mix well, then add about ⅓ of the can of pumpkin. Repeat this step until all of the flour mix and all of the pumpkin are mixed with the sugar mix.

At this point, you can preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

Take one of your baking sheets and cover it with parchment paper(or spray with PAM), then drop spoonfuls of the batter onto the paper, slightly flattening the tops, about 2” apart.

Put the tray onto the middle rack of the oven and bake for about ten minutes.

Take them out when they’re golden brown and soft to the touch.

Remove from the cookie sheet and put onto the cooling rack.

Line the halves up in pairs. This will make filling them a lot easier.

Squeeze a dollop of your favorite frosting on top of one of the sides to make a cloud of frosting on one of the halves

Then, put another half on top of the frosting cloud. This will make a sandwich out of cake and frosting.

Continue this process until all of your halves are filled and topped.

Then you’re done! They can be stacked on a plate to eat immediately, or kept in an airtight container for later

 These are easy to make and best of all, taste amazing. They’re convenient for all of your Fall functions since they’re small, and can be easily carried around, giving them two thumbs up in my family. Every family has that one dish that everyone looks forward to on the holidays, and this is mine. I strongly encourage you to roll your sleeves up and give it a try – you might just find your family’s new favorite dessert.