4 Simple Recipes to Try Over Break
Ava Fowler and Jing Wang - December 4th, 2023
As the holidays are fast approaching, there are many foods and desserts families look forward to eating, and today we’ll be teaching you four easy recipes to make for loved ones! We will start off with the recipes for an addicting loaf of pumpkin bread (speaking from personal experience, you literally won’t be able to stop eating it) followed by a recipe for some silly gingerbread people. Then, for the ever-neglected holiday of Thanksgiving, there’s a simple recipe for pumpkin pie! We even have a small bonus “recipe” on how to make whipped cream as well, so stay tuned for that! Finally, even though it’s not as festive, we also included the classic Snickerdoodle cookie. The recipes we used will be linked at the bottom of the article in case you want to look at the original!
Pumpkin Bread!
*From Sugar and Charm on Pinterest
The first food on our list is pumpkin bread. Let me tell you, once you take a bite of this bread, you’ll want to just finish the whole loaf at once; it’s just that good. Only taking about 1 ½ hours, it can be a last minute Thanksgiving addition to your table. You can also slice it and divvy it up to your friends and/or family!
Ingredients:
1 can of pumpkin puree
4 large eggs
1 cup of vegetable oil
⅔ cups water
3 cups white sugar
3 ½ cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking soda
1 ½ tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg
½ tsp ground cloves
¼ tsp ground ginger
Steps:
The pumpkin bread was very straightforward to make. First, I preheated the oven to 350°. Then, I put parchment paper on a loaf pan and greased it with butter.
With a whisk, I mixed the dry ingredients: flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and ginger.
From there, I mixed the wet ingredients--pumpkin puree, eggs, oil, water, and sugar-- using a stand mixer.
With the stand mixer running with the wet ingredients, I sifted the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture.
After it was blended well, I poured the batter into the pans, and there was enough batter for 2 ½ loaves.
I put the bread in the oven for 50 minutes and checked to see if it was ready by poking the middle with a fork. It needed a bit more time so I left the bread in the oven with the oven turned off for about 8 more minutes. After that, the bread was crumbly, a bit moist and not too sweet.
Gingerbread Cookies
See picture from up to down: Big Mama, Man, Timmy,
Decapitated Timmy, Sally 1, and Sally 2. The boy with
one eyeball is Mike.
Gingerbread cookies are a timeless favorite for Christmas. Between the grand gingerbread house competitions to decorating these cute gingerpeople, it is a staple at any Christmas gathering, and we’ll be showing you how to make some of these yummy cookies!
Ingredients:
3 ½ cups of all purpose flour
½ tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp ground ginger
½ tsp ground allspice
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp ground cloves
10 tbsp softened unsalted butter
¾ cup of brown sugar
1 large room-temperature egg
1 stp vanilla extract
Icing for decorating (optional)
See below: Dry and Wet Ingredients & Finished Products
Steps:
You will need two large bowls for this. In one bowl, mix the flour, salt, baking soda, ground ginger, allspice, cinnamon, and cloves.
In the other bowl, get the softened butter and beat it until it’s smooth. Then, combine the butter with molasses and brown sugar until it comes together. Finally, add the egg and vanilla extract and beat all the wet ingredients together.
Add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients.
4. Once the ingredients have mixed, split the dough in half and mold each half into a disc shape. Once it’s been molded, plastic wrap it.
5. Now sit back and relax as you chill the dough in your fridge for a minimum of 3 hours. Maybe try that new tv show or do some homework.
6. Alright! Back from break. Preheat your oven to 350°F and get your gingerbread dough from the fridge.
7. Get two baking trays and put parchment paper on top of each one. Also, grab a rolling pin, flour, and a large cutting board.
8. Flour the cutting board generously, and break up each one of your gingerbread discs into smaller parts to make it easier for yourself to roll the dough. After you’ve rolled the dough, use cookie cutters to make your gingerpeople or gingerthings (?). After you’re done making shapes, re-roll the scraps of the dough and continue making shapes until you’ve run out of dough.
9. Bake the gingerbread for 10 minutes.
10. Allow around 5-10 for the cookies to cool, and from there, you’re welcome to decorate!
Pumpkin Pie
Ingredients:
1 pie crust (homemade or store)
3 large eggs
1 cup sugar
½ tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
¼ ground cloves
¼ ground ginger
¼ nutmeg
1 15 oz pumpkin purée can
1 cup milk
The ingredients for the whipped cream are:
1 cup heavy whipping cream
2 tbsp powdered sugar
½ tsp vanilla extract
Steps:
Prepare pie crusts in a regular pie dish
Preheat oven to 450°F
In a medium bowl, mix all dry ingredients (sugar, salt, ground cinnamon, ground cloves, ground ginger, nutmeg).
Stir in pumpkin and milk, mix well
*I didn’t have milk so I used ½ cup heavy whipping cream and ½ cup water and it turned out fine
Pour pumpkin mixture into prepared pie thing
Put in oven for 10 minutes, then lower the heat to 350 and wait 40-45 minutes
*I accidentally left mine in for over an hour but nothing bad happened it still tasted fantastical
Steps for whipped cream:
Pour all 3 ingredients into a mixing bowl.
Whip into stiff peaks then serve!
Snickerdoodles
These classic cookies will melt in your mouth and bring a smile to your face. This snickerdoodle recipe is easy to follow, produces around 30 cookies, and takes less than an hour to make!
The ingredients for the dough are…
2 ¾ cups of all-purpose flour (I prefer unbleached)
2 teaspoons of cream of tartar
1 teaspoon of baking soda
½ of salt
1 cup of softened unsalted butter
1 ½ cups of white sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
The ingredients for the coating are:
½ cup sugar
2 tbsp cinnamon
“The cookies were very tasty. Paired with a fresh drink, they were the perfect snack to have. I would rate them a 9.3/10 and recommend them to anyone wanting to try.”
-Aidan Hobbs
☆☆☆☆☆
Steps:
preheat the oven to 350°F
In a large bowl mix flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt then set aside
Cream together the barely softened butter and sugar then add eggs, vanilla and mix well.
Add dry Ingredients to the wet ingredients .
In a small bowl, combine ⅓ cup sugar and 2 tbsp cinnamon for the coating.
Scoop out cookie dough and roll into a small ball then roll the ball in the coating until coated to your liking.
Place cookies 2 inches apart on your prepared pan.
Bake for 8-10 minutes. Let cookies sit in the turned off oven to set for a bit. Once cooled they are ready to eat!
Pumpkin Bread: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/6820/downeast-maine-pumpkin-bread/
Gingerbread: https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/best-gingerbread-cookies/
Pumpkin Pie: Walmart brand pumpkin pie yum
Snickerdoodles: https://lilluna.com/snickerdoodles/
