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Fall...
leaves, cooler weather, and pumpkin.
Everywhere, pumpkin.
I am a huge fan of pumpkin. I don't even wait until fall to use it. I just wait until fall to admit to using it. You can sneak it into everything, from desserts to ravioli. It seems similar to bananas in the way we like to put it into muffins, pancakes, oatmeal, quick breads, cakes, cookies and more. Or like applesauce in the way we substitute some of the butter or oil in a recipe to lighten it up. Not only is pumpkin just plain wonderful as far as flavor and versatility, but let's look at it from a nutritional point of view:
1 cup pumpkin 1 cup mashed bananas 1 cup applesauce
83 calories 200 calories 102 calories
19 g carbs 51 g carbs 27.5 g carbs
7 g fiber 5 g fiber 2.7 g fiber
2.7 g protein 2.5 g protein .4 g protein
63 mg calcium 11 mg calcium 9.8 mg calcium
504 mg potassium 805 mg potassium 189 mg potassium
It's hard to beat bananas when it comes to potassium, but in every other way, I feel pumpkin is the clear winner. It packs a lot of nutrition in not a lot of calories. Depending on what you pair with pumpkin, you can taste it a little or a lot. In a chocolate cake or brownies, use pumpkin instead of the oil and you will hardly even taste the pumpkin and cut the calories and fat significantly. You can substitute a third to half the butter in your favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe and likely no one will be the wiser. Minus the addition of chocolate, pumpkin's flavor can shine through. When you want to make it the star of the show, a little cinnamon or pumpkin pie spice will highlight the pumpkin flavor. Throw a spoonful of pumpkin in a smoothie, tuck some into stuffed shells with some feta, or stir it into french toast batter - I mean really, you can add it to anything!
These pumpkin muffins are a great go-to for a quick breakfast or easy snack:
Pumpkin Oat Protein Muffins
What you'll need:
2 cups oats
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 scoop vanilla protein powder
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 cup Greek yogurt
2 eggs
1 cup pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla
for topping:
2 tsp sugar
1/4 tsp cinnamon
What you'll do:
Pulse the oats in a food processor until they become oat flour. Transfer to large bowl and mix all the dry ingredients together. Then add the remaining ingredients and mix until just combined. Using a large cookie scoop, drop batter into muffin tins sprayed with cooking spray. (You can use cupcake liners - just know the muffins will stick a little and not come out of the papers cleanly.) With no flour, these don't rise very much so you can really fill up the muffin tins. Mix the cinnamon and sugar for topping and sprinkle about 1/8 tsp over the top of each muffin. Bake at 375 for about 18-21 minutes or until pick comes out clean. Makes about 12 muffins.
Nutritional Info: 1 muffin 170 calories, 7.7 g protein, 26.2 g carbs, 4.3 g fat
And with the half a can of pumpkin you have left, you can always make...
Pumpkin Snickerdoodles
What you'll need:
1/2 cup butter
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
3/4 cup pumpkin
2 tsp vanilla
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp cream of tartar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
What you'll do:
Cream the butter and sugars. Add in pumpkin and egg and mix well. By hand, stir in remaining ingredients. Cover and refrigerate until firm or if you're impatient, put the dough in the freezer for a bit.
Mix 2 Tbsp sugar with 1/4 tsp cinnamon. Scoop dough into walnut size cookies and roll in cinnamon sugar. Bake at 350 for 11-12 minutes. Makes about 4 dozen cookies.
Nutrition Info: serving size: 2 cookies, 110 calories, 2 g protein, 15.5 g carbs, 4.4 g fat