Whoa! It’s Christmas at my local Costco! I haven’t even embraced the idea of Halloween yet, let alone considered spending $1000 (Yikes!) for an artificial tree. (For that price, maybe the tree comes complete with the presents!)
Pumpkin is beginning to sound good to me, though. Maybe it is all those pumpkin displays at my local Trader Joe’s.
Here is a little pumpkin history. Pumpkin has been around for a very long time. According to the History Channel, pumpkin was first cultivated in Central America around 5000 B.C. and was one of the first foods taken back to Europe by explorers. The colonists would have been familiar with the fruits when they arrived in America and well before that fateful first Thanksgiving where they sliced off the pumpkin top, cleaned out the seeds and filled the pumpkin with milk, spices and honey before baking it in hot ashes.
These modern-day Pumpkin Bars are everything a pumpkin lover could want. They are intensely fragrant and beautifully orange. Topped with the brown sugar frosting, you get a real pop of “caramely” brown sugar goodness with every bite.
This recipe for Praline Pumpkin Bars is from the October 2023 Restaurant issue of Food and Wine Magazine. You can find the original recipe here.
Here is the recipe for the Pumpkin Bars as I prepared them in my kitchen. This is a big cake, so prepare to share it with your friends.
Pumpkin Bars
Ingredients
- For the Pumpkin Bars:
- 2 C. all-purpose flour
- 1 t. baking powder
- 1 t. ground cinnamon
- 1 t. ground ginger
- 1 t. ground nutmeg
- 1/2 t. baking soda
- 1/2 t. fine sea salt (I used pink salt)
- 1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin puree
- 1 C. granulated sugar
- 1 C. vegetable oil (I used grapeseed oil)
- 4 large eggs
- For the Frosting:
- 3 C. powdered sugar
- 3/4 C. packed light brown sugar
- 6 T. unsalted butter
- 1/3 C. heavy cream
- 1 t. vanilla extract
- 1 C. chopped toasted pecans
Directions
- Step 1 Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- Step 2 Prepare a 9 inch by 13 inch pan by oiling the pan and then putting a sheet of parchment on the bottom of the pan.
- Step 3 Add flour, baking powder, salt, and spices to a bowl. Whisk.
- Step 4 In a separate bowl, whisk together pumpkin puree, sugar, vegetable oil and eggs until you have a smooth batter. Add the flour mixture to the pumpkin puree mixture. Mix these ingredients just until you have incorporated the flour into the pumpkin mixture. Pour this batter into your prepared 9 inch by 13 inch pan. Smooth the top. Bake in a 350 degree F. oven for about 25 minutes. Your cake layer is done when it springs back when pressed with your fingers and when a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool cake on a wire rack until completely cool–about 2 hours.
- Step 5 While the cake is cooling, prepare the frosting. Sift the powdered sugar into a heat-proof bowl and set aside.
- Step 6 Put brown sugar, butter and cream into a saucepan and heat over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Bring this mixture to a boil and continue boiling for about a minute after that. Quickly, pour the brown sugar mixture into the prepared powdered sugar. Add vanilla and whisk the frosting until smooth. Move quickly, this frosting hardens very quickly. Spread the frosting over the cooled cake. Sprinkle the toasted chopped pecans over the top of the cake. Cool for about 30 minutes until the frosting is set.
