Pumpkin Pancakes

Pumpkin Pancakes are moist and warm with the added spices and these are fluffy. Perfect for autumn season as you get more pumpkin during harvest, and also for Halloween party or Thanksgiving. You could make it with tinned pumpkin puree too. But i prefer preparing it fresh and use it with in a week.

These pumpkin pancakes turns more healthy if it is prepared with whole wheat flour, honey and with coconut oil. These are quick to make and easy to make healthy breakfast prepared in minutes. Could be served as a after school snack for kids too.

INGREDIENTS:
Whole wheat flour| All purpose flour- 2 cup

Baking powder- 2 tablespoons

Cinnamon powder- 1/2 teaspoon

Nutmeg- 1/4 teaspoon (optional)

Salt- 1/4 teaspoon

Milk- 1 and 1/2 cups

Pumpkin Puree- 3/4 cup

Egg-1

Sugar| Honey- 3-4 tablespoons

Vanilla extract- 1 teaspoon

Butter| coconut oil-2+2 tablespoons

Cream Cheese Topping:

Cream Cheese- 1/2 cup

Sugar- 1-2 teaspoons

Milk- 3 tablespoons

Pecan| Walnuts- 2-3 tablespoons, for extra crunchy topping

PROCEDURE:

To make Pumpkin Puree:

• Peel the pumpkin and cut them into cubes. Add the pumpkin inside the pan and pour enough water to immerse; allow to cook till soft.
• Drain the water and allow to cool. Once it reaches room temperature add this inside a blender jar and make it as a fine puree.

To make Pan cake:

• Mix the dry ingredients flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt together in a medium mixing bowl.
• In a separate bowl, whisk the rest of the ingredients together milk, pumpkin puree, egg, sugar| honey, vanilla and butter until combined. 
• Pour the wet ingredients into the dry, and stir until blended. 
• Heat a heavy cast iron skillet or nonstick griddle over medium-low heat. You’re ready to start cooking your pancakes once the surface of the pan is hot enough that a drop of water sizzles on contact.
• If necessary, lightly oil the cooking surface with additional oil or cooking spray.
• Using a ¼-cup measure, scoop the batter onto the warm skillet. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes until small bubbles form on the surface of the pancakes (you'll know it's ready to flip when about ½-inch of the perimeter is matte instead of glossy), and flip. Cook on the opposite sides for 1 to 2 minutes, or until lightly golden brown.
• Repeat the process with the remaining batter, adding more oil as needed. 
• Top it with Honey (or) cream cheese frosting and add some pecans (or) walnuts for extra crunch.

To make Cream Cheese Topping:

• In medium bowl, beat cream cheese, butter and milk with electric mixer on low speed until smooth.
• Fill this in a piping bag or drop directly using a spoon.

Read More »

Pumpkin Oatmeal Choco-Chip Muffins

Pumpkin Oatmeal Choco-Chip Muffins is a variation of Pumpkin Wheat Bran Muffins. I wanted to prepare pumpkin and chocolate combination and finally here comes the recipe for that. I loved the taste of the muffins really healthy and feels light. This muffin vary from the previous pumpkin muffin a lot in texture, taste..etc. The muffins i made with wheat bran the taste of the bran i could feel here i could not taste the taste of the oats and the oats gives the feel like flour. I love the taste of the bran in my bread or muffins so if you donot like the taste of the bran the best healthy choice is oats.

I make muffin quite often nowadays. As it is summer here making muffins and storing in refrigerator and using whenever i feel hungry or feel like to munch some thing. I just reheat them for 30 seconds in microwave and have them without any guilt. These are healthy filling snack or a breakfast even a late night snack for me.

Pumpkin Oatmeal Choco-Chip Muffins

Prep time

10 mins

Cook time

20 mins

Total time

30 mins

Author: Eliza Lincy
Cuisine: American
Category: Cakes & Bake

Yields: 12 muffins

Ingredients

• Whole Wheat Flour| All Purpose Flour- 1 and 1/2 cups
  Corn Flour- 2 tablespoons (add if you make with whole wheat flour)
  Oats, rolled- 1 cup
  Sugar, powderd| brown sugar- 3/4 cup
  Baking powder- 1 teaspoon
  Baking Soda- 1/2 teaspoon
  Salt- pinch
  Egg-1(or) Yogurt- 1/4 cup for eggless version
  Oil- 1/2 cup
  Milk- 1/2 cup 
  Vanilla essence- 1 teaspoon
  Pumpkin puree- 1 cup
  Chocolate chips- 1/2 cup
• 
  

Instructions

• To make pumpkin puree, cut the pumpkin and scoop the seed and keep the pumpkin on a tray and bake on 200 degrees preheated oven for 30 minutes or until the flesh becomes soft. (or)
• You could peel and cut them into small pieces and boil with enough water to submerge and cook till soft and drain the water; cool the pieces and blend to make a paste.
• Preheat the oven to 180 degrees for 10 minutes.
• In a deep bowl add the dry ingredients; whole wheat flour, corn flour, rolled oats, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt; Mix well with a ladle or whisk.

• In another bowl crack the egg and then add oil, milk, vanilla essence and the pumpkin puree; beat well with a ladle or whisk.

• Now gradually add the dry ingredients and mix well with out any lumps.
• If the batter feel thick add one or two tablespoons of milk to loosen the batter.

• Add the chocolate chips and fold well.
• Line the muffin tray with paper liner or spray the tray with oil and add fill the cups with batter.

• Bake the muffins for 15-20 minutes till the skewer inserted in the center of the muffin comes out clean.

Notes

• You could also make this with all purpose flour or use a mix of whole wheat flour and all purpose flour 1:1 ratio.
• You could add some chopped nuts or dry fruits for additional taste.

Read More »

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Bran Muffins

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Muffins| Spiced Whole Wheat Pumpkin Muffins was in my to do list for a long time. I have already posted pumpkin cake recipe two years before on Halloweens Day. But this recipe is totally healthy and you can have this muffins with out any guilt. I have used whole wheat flour and added extra wheat bran to nourish it further. I have prepared many muffins earlier but used small proportion of all purpose flour. But in this recipe i have not added and the outcome was totally moist and delicious airy muffins. I was so happy about the outcome. Do try this soft and moist totally guilt free healthy nutritious muffins!

I love whole wheat bread or muffins with the bran in it. Nowadays I start hating white bread like milk bread, sandwich bread or burger buns which are prepared with all purpose flour. The above said store bought ones are so sweet for my palette. So i buy only whole wheat ones. Even i do not like brown bread, i feel that as tasteless and dry. Whole wheat is perfect for my palette, this muffins comes close to that with the moist texture. I loved them with the crunch of walnuts!

Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Cooking Time:20 minutes
Category: Breakfast
Cuisine: Continental
Makes: 12 muffins

INGREDIENTS:
Whole Wheat flour| Atta- 1 and 1/2 cups
Corn Flour- 3 tablespoons
Wheat Bran- 3/4 cup
Baking powder- 1 teaspoon
Baking Soda- 3/4 teaspoon
Salt- pinch
Brown sugar| granulated sugar- 3/4 -1cup (according to your wish)
Cinnamon powder- 1 teaspoon
Walnuts, broken into pieces- 1 cup
Egg-1
Yogurt- 1/4 cup
Oil- 1/2 cup
Vanilla essence- 1 teaspoon
Pumpkin Puree- 1 cup

PROCEDURE:

• To make pumpkin puree, cut the pumpkin and scoop the seed and keep the pumpkin on a tray and bake on 200 degrees preheated oven for 30 minutes or until the flesh becomes soft. (or)
• You could peel and cut them into small pieces and boil with enough water to submerge and cook till soft and drain the water; cool the pieces and blend to make a paste.
• In a bowl beat the egg and add the yogurt, oil, vanilla essence and pumpkin puree; mix together and set aside.
• In another bowl mix the dry ingredients; wheat flour, corn flour, wheat bran, baking powder, baking soda, salt, sugar, cinnamon powder and walnuts.
• Gradually add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and mix well.
• Line the muffin tray with liners or spray or grease the muffin pan.
• Fill the tray with the batter and bake the muffins for 15-20 minutes until the skewer inserted at the center of the muffin comes out clean.
• Note: You could replace walnuts with any nuts or raisins like dry fruits of your choice.
• Add brown sugar 3/4 cup for less sweeter muffins and for normal sweetness add 1 cup of brown sugar.
• You could replace brown sugar with normal granulated sugar or powdered jaggery too.
• You could replace wheat bran with oatmeal if you do not like the taste of it.

 

Read More »

Instant Pumpkin Dosa

Pumpkin dosa is a variety dosa which does not require any fermentation. This dosa adds nutrition to our daily diet. Crispy dosas which could be made in two methods either by concentric circles or similar to rava dosa with holes in it. These no-ferment dosas are easy to prepare also save you a lot of time. You could prepare these dosas for breakfast, dinner or even for brunch.

Best dosas which could be made when you have no prior plan for breakfast or dinner. About the taste of the dosa these are spicy, garlicky and crispy. This dosa goes well with any kind of chutneys and sambar or chutney powders.

INGREDIENTS:

Raw rice- 1 cup

Pumpkin, chopped-1 cup

Dry Red chillies-3
Garlic- 4 big cloves

Jeera- 1/2 teaspoon
Asafetida/Hing- 1/4 teaspoon

Salt- to taste
Oil- 1/2 teaspoon/dosa

PROCEDURE:

• Wash and soak the rice in enough water to immerse.
• Drain the water and keep the rice, chopped pumpkin, dry red chillies, garlic, jeera, asafetida and salt inside the blender jar and grind to make a fine paste by adding around 1 cup of water. Make sure there are no unground pieces.

• Transfer the batter inside the bowl and add about two cups of water to dilute the batter and add salt if required. Batter should be thin.

• Heat a tawa and grease with oil; add a ladle full of batter and make concentric circles.
• Drizzle with half a teaspoon of oil and roast the dosas till crispy.
• It takes longer time to cook than regular dosa.

• Or add extra one more cup (3 cups or more) of water to dilute the batter and make like rava dosa with holes in it.(I have added extra 1/2 teaspoon of whole jeera while making this dosa in the batter for flavour)
• Heat a tawa to high heat and pour the batter from edges to the centre and fill the gaps with batter.

• Drizzle oil on top and roast well till crispy. Once it is cooked you could easily remove the dosa from the pan. Do not flip and cook the dosas.
• You could make this same dosa with normal dosa batter by grinding ingredients except rice as a fine paste and add in to the dosa batter and mix well.

• Note:You could refrigerate the left over batter for later use.
• Mix the batter well and prepare each dosa add water to the batter if required after preparing some dosas.
• Heat of the pan is essential to form the holes in that dosa.
• You could sprinkle some onion in the tawa and drizzle the pumpkin batter and make dosas similar to onion rava dosas.

Read More »

Pumpkin Chutney

Pumpkin Chutney is a flavourful chutney which could be made in minutes on any busy morning. Easy to prepare side dish for idli dosa with limited ingredients. You would not feel the sweetness of the pumpkin in this chutney, as red chillies add to it's spicy taste.

I have shared some of the chutney recipes earlier and today i am doing so with a delicious chutney using a vegetable. I like to prepare this chutney by sauteing the pumpkin rather cooking it in water. While cooking in water the nutrients from the pumpkin lost in water. The roasting adds taste and also the aroma to chutney.

INGREDIENTS:
Red Pumpkin, chopped- 1 cup
Dry red chillies- 3-4
Urad dhal- 1 tablespoon
Tamarind - small piece
Salt- to taste
Oil- 2 teaspoon
Coconut, grated- 1/4 cup

To temper:
Oil- 2 teaspoon
Mustard seeds-1/2 teaspoon
Curry leaves- 1 strand
Asafetida/ Hing- pinch

PROCEDURE:

• Peel the pumpkin and cut them into small to medium sized pieces; set aside.
• Heat two teaspoons of oil and add the urad dhal and red chillies and roast till the dhal turns golden colour. Now add the tamarind and cook for a second;  transfer the ingredients on a plate and allow to cool.
• In the same oil add the pumpkin pieces with some salt and saute till it becomes soft but not mushy. 

• Check the doneness by pricking with a spoon or fork. You could cook too but the nutrients and also the taste get lost in the cooking water. Roasting gives nice flavour and taste to the chutney.
• Once the pumpkin get cooked transfer it with the urad dhal and allow to cool for sometime.
• Add everything in a blender jar with coconut and grind as a paste. Add 1/4 cup of water to dilute the chutney if you wish.
• Heat oil in a pan and splutter the mustard seeds and curry leaves finally add a pinch of asafetida and switch off the gas.

• Add the tempering over the chutney and mix well. 
• Note: Add two small/ pearl onion and grind to make chammanthi/ thogayal to have it with rice.

Read More »

Pumpkin Cookies/ Pumpkin Almond Cookies

Halloween day is celebrated on 31st October and Pumpkins are very special on Halloween day celebration. Mainly the pumpkins are cut and inside flesh is scooped out and then carved into various shapes and inside a light source such as candles are placed to make Jack-o'-lantern. The dishes prepared using pumpkins are special for Halloween day such as cakes, tarts and cookies..etc.

Today morning i referred here and made these cookies in my way for this year Halloween Day with pumpkin puree and almonds and tried to give a pumpkin like shape. Kids really love these cookies. Perfect sweet delight for the Halloween Party!

Preparation Time:10 minutes

Cooking Time: 20 minutes

Makes: 8-10 cookies

INGREDIENTS:

Butter, softened- 1/2 cup (100g)

Sugar, powdered- 1/2 cup

Pumpkin Puree- 1/2 cup

Vanilla extract- 1 teaspoon

Food colour- orange (two drops)

Almond meal(or) almond powder- 1/4 cup

Cinnamon powder- 1/2 teaspoon

Salt- 1/2 teaspoon

All purpose Flour/ Maida-1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cups

Almonds- 8-10 nos
Honey- 2 tablespoon

PROCEDURE:

• Make almond powder if you do not get almond meal use whole almonds or use blanched almonds( If you use almond with peel, drop the almonds in hot boiled water and allow to cook for 5 minutes or the skin starts to loosen. Do not cook long as the almonds starts to soften. Drain almonds from water and peel them and wipe them well without any moisture.)
• Take the blanched almonds inside the blender and pulse to get a  fine powder. Do not grind and make it as a paste (almond butter)

• Preheat the oven to 180 degrees for 15 minutes.
• In a bowl add the room temperature butter and beat well using an electric whisk or hand whisk.
• Add the powdered sugar and beat again till fluffy.

• Now add the pumpkin puree, vanilla extract and food colour (I have added last and find difficult to mix)and beat well for fifteen seconds till the colour mixed well uniformly.
• Now add the almond meal/powder, cinnamon powder and salt; beat well till combined.

• Add the all purpose flour 1/2 cup at a time and beat well. When u finish adding 1 cup the mixture will be slightly thick. Now remove the beater and add the flour and mix gently using hands and make a soft dough.
• Divide the dough into 4 balls and transfer into a fridge and chill for 15 minutes.

• After that remove the dough and make them in to 8-10 lemon sized balls and keep on a baking tray lined with wax paper. Hold the balls in fingers and give 6-8 incisions the sides using a knife.
• At the top of each ball press with index finger and make a small depression.
• In that fix the almonds tapering end.

• Keep the tray inside the oven and bake for 20 minutes or until the cookies outside feels hard to touch.
• When the cookies came out from the oven it looked dull so i brushed them with honey to give them a fresh look. 

Read More »

Pumpkin Cake

Halloween Day is around the corner and all are making ready for the Halloween costumes, food and settings for the Halloween day party. Spooky scary foods are special for halloween day and pumpkins are very special. So i planned to prepare a pumpkin cake for this Halloween day. Pumpkin cake finally i made it in pumpkin shape.

Easy to prepare cake and the icing too super easy just mix and whip. About the taste of the cake it is soft and moist, mildly spiced with nuts and raisins. So flavourful cake similar to a fruit cake. Nutty and Fruity Halloween Delight!!!

INGREDIENTS:
Pumpkin puree (fresh/ tinned) -2 cups
Walnuts- 1 cup
Golden raisins-1 cup
Eggs-4
Sugar- 1 and 1/2 cups
Oil- 1 and 1/4 cups
Vanilla essence- 1 teaspoon
All purpose Flour-3 cups
Baking powder- 1  teaspoons
Baking Soda- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons
Cinnamon powder- 1/2 teaspoon
Clove powder 1/4 teaspoon
Nutmeg- 1/4 teaspoon (optional)
Dry/ fresh ginger powder- 1/4 teaspoon

For Frosting:
Ice cream cone-1
Cream Cheese- 1 (200 g packet)
Thick cream- 1(125 ml packet)
Sugar- 4-5 teaspoons

PROCEDURE:

• Peel the pumpkin and cut them in to pieces.
• Add water and cook till soft for about 10 minutes. When it becomes soft to touch drain the water and allow to cool.

• Transfer the pumpkin pieces into a blender and finely puree them; set aside.

• In a separate bowl sift/ sieve the flour, baking powder, baking soda together.
• Add in the spices cinnamon powder, clove, nutmeg and ginger powders; mix well.
• Take a tablespoon of flour from this and coat the raisins and walnuts (to prevent sinking inside the batter);set aside.
• Preheat the oven to 160  degrees for 15 minutes.
• In a bowl beat the eggs till frothy using electric beater or hand whisk.

• Powder the sugar and add into the egg mixture.
• Add the cooked pumpkin puree and oil and vanilla essence; blend well.

• Add this spiced flour mixture half a cup at a time and mix well repeat the process till the whole flour mixture get incorporated with egg mixture.
• Fold in the raisins and nuts inside the cake batter.

• Grease the pan (Use one bundt pan or two 20 cm round cake tins)with oil or butter and dust with a tablespoon of flour by tapping the pan and coat the pan without touching with hands.
• Pour the batter evenly on the cake pan and level the top and tap slightly to remove any air bubbles.

• Bake the cake for about 1 hour or till the inserted skewer comes out clean from the cake.
• Allow the cake to cool down completely before icing.

• Frosting:
• In a bowl add cream cheese, thick cream and powdered sugar. Beat till well combined.
• Take a tablespoon of icing and add green food colour. Add orange food colour in the remaining icing; mix well.

• Apply the green icing on the ice cream waffer cone for the pumpkin stem.
• Fill the cake's cavity with anything edible or fill with tissue or foil paper and keep the stem on top.
• Apply orange colour icing on the cake.

Read More »