Please don't tell Martha I renamed her lovely Pumpkin Whoopie Pies. She is quite the stickler for details. While I know she has heard of Arkansas, I don't know if she has actually been here. And I'm almost certain she has never seen a grown man wearing a Hog Hat cheering like crazy in a stadium full of other fans. Of course, she is
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| WOO PIG SOOIE PIES |
Although Martha has cooked a truckload of hog products, from bacon to ham to tenderloin to chops, I can't really see her calling the Hogs, throwing her arms straight into the air and wiggling her fingers while screaming Woo Pig Sooie. Around here it is common knowledge the call came from folks calling their pigs (Hogs) back to the old homeplace. As a national producer of pork products, the little piggy that stayed home is definitely a bit sharper than the little piggy hurrying to market.
This delicious Whoopie Pie answers the quest for the frantic fall search for all things pumpkin. And a tasty addition to any tailgate party whether outside in the elements or around a coffee table.
Honestly, the recipe is labor intensive but always worth the effort. I finally got smart and fixed the cookies ahead of schedule and stuck them in the freezer until needed. Great idea. On party day, I thawed them in the fridge.
Anything with cream cheese frosting is worth the effort. The butter, cream cheese, vanilla and powdered sugar are meant to be together.
But I'm not the Queen of Piping which is a talent Miss Martha can do with her eyes shut. I try. When you don't have an industrial plastic bag dedicated to frosting frufru on cupcakes and rolled out sugar cookies, but you have the whole tipping caboodle leftover from the happy homemaker days of piping as a way of life when necessary, you improvise. I don't have an assistant to run out and purchase emergency supplies in the middle of creaming butter and cream cheese.
However, with six finished, piped, filled cookies, I paused to think that my improvisation using a storebrand baggie might not end well. It didn't. I resorted to my handy dandy multifunctional iced tea spoon for plopping cream cheese frosting. I don't know which would have troubled Miss Martha the most, using a baggie for a piping bag or the improper usage of my tea spoon. Here is the delicious, worth every effort, fallish, pumpkin recipe.
PUMPKIN WHOOPIE PIES
Cake Ingredients
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 tablespoons ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1 tablespoon ground cloves
2 cups firmly packed dark brown sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
1 can pumpkin filling, chilled
2 eggs
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| TO THE RESCUE |
Filling Ingredients
3 cups confectioners' sugar
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
8 oz. cream cheese, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, whisk flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger and cloves together. Set aside. In a stand mixer, mix brown sugar and oil until well combined. Add pumpkin filling and mix well. Add eggs and vanilla until well combined. Sprinkle flour mixture over pumpkin mixture until fully incorporated. Drop heaping tablespoons of dough on a parchment-lined baking sheet about 1 inch apart. Bake until cookies are just starting to crack on the top - about 15 minutes.
Sift confectioners' sugar in a large bowl. In a stand mixer with a paddle attachment beat the butter until smooth. Add the cream cheese until well combined. Add sugar and vanilla and beat just until smooth. Transfer filling to a disposable pastry bag and spread a healthy portion on the bottom side of one cookie and place the second cookie on top. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
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Using culinary flare, arrange the finished Woo Pig Sooie Pies on a plate, in a basket, or atop a mini hay bale. Accent with mums, daisies, acorns, leaves or mini pumpkins and gourds. Place on a handwoven, hand dyed with berries from your summer garden, tablecloth. Watch the pies disappear!
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