i'd rather be baking

Is it just me, or are we all so happy it’s the weekend? This week flew by and I think it’s because I spent so much of it in the kitchen. This time of year always makes me want to spend every afternoon in my warm little kitchen, baking and cooking away. Lately I have found myself eager to experiment with new flavors and foods and these muffins are the perfect example. It’s no secret that I love pumpkin, but incorporating it into more savory applications has been a new, fun, and delicious challenge.

I made these muffins one night last week when it seemed that fall had happened overnight. Do you know the sort of change I mean? Suddenly it’s dark before seven at night and venturing out early in the morning requires a fleece jacket. Naturally, I find myself making things like pumpkin cornbread.

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About two weeks ago, I dragged a seriously unattractive version of myself to the grocery store on a Saturday night, in search of ginger ale and crackers for dinner thanks to a mild case of food poisoning. As I walked through the produce section those cute little pie pumpkins caught my eye and I thought I’d check the baking aisle for pumpkin puree. Low and behold, there it was. I’ll be honest; I bought five cans.

And then this weekend, we saw some at one of those super-nice Walmarts out in the suburbs, and Ryan instantly grabbed two more. What can I say, we now have that depression mentality when it comes to pumpkin. Or you could call it hoarding. I don’t really care.

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A couple of months ago, when my local Walmart had zero cans of pumpkin and blogs were buzzing about the so-called shortage, I stocked up on a few cans as soon as I could find them. I’ve been working my way through them slowly but surely, as you may have seen.

The beauty of canned pumpkin is that the average can contains quite enough for several batches of goodness. And when I came across this glorious-sounding recipe, it seemed like the perfect use for the half-full can sitting in my refrigerator.

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People, sometimes I make things too complicated. Seriously.

This weekend was a prime example. Due to an excellent price at Sam’s, I now have cranberries coming out of my ears and kind of need to start using them. And for some reason, nearly every recipe I could find that sounded remotely yummy was heavily dependent on the presence of some form of orange (be it juice or zest), and I just wasn’t interested in going to the store for one orange.

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This time of year I can’t seem to leave the grocery store without at least a handful of apples and often a three-pound sack. And when the Granny Smiths (my personal favorite) drop down to the neighborhood of $1/pound, I’m a goner.

I eat the vast majority of these apples sliced or simply out of hand, but I do love baking with them. I stumbled across this recipe while researching road bikes (of all things), and it’s a remarkably healthy one. There’s just enough butter present to make it hearty and satisfying, but the apples, oats, and pecans contribute the real flavor and, beautifully, lots of yummy vitamins.

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