From the Archives: Joy’s Best Pumpkin Cookies

Trick or Treat

This will be a very different October for me. We are moving into—well, we have moved into—a lovely apartment with a view of the rooftops and sunsets of Bologna, with the suitcases that have followed us for three years. The 106 boxes are arriving from Milan just in time for Halloween. Right now we are using borrowed chairs, a leftover table from the previous owner, and a newly purchased bed, which is divine to sleep on, by the way. Halloween is second in line as my favorite holiday. I can hardly wait to unearth my snake wreath to hang on the front door. Thank you, Martha Stewart.

I want to share with you the best fall and Halloween cookie, and no, it does not resemble those AI-generated spooky cookies proliferating on Pinterest—cute visuals, but I bet they have no flavor. This one is a showstopper in flavor and texture, and it is an annual request from my family. It is one of the most sought-after recipes from our Cuisinette files.

Our Star Baker

Joy’s Pumpkin Cookies were an annual treat at the shop from our star baking Cuisinette, Stephanie Gorenflo. Stephanie trained in the professional pastry program at the now-defunct L’Academie de Cuisine. We other mortal Cuisinettes were sure a baking angel had sent her to us. When she drove in from Mount Airy, Maryland, to work at La Cuisine, she often had something delicious for us to eat—always of the non-salad variety.

One of Stephanie’s heaven-sent treats was her pumpkin cookie recipe, which came from her good friend Joy. Stephanie and Joy have been baking besties for years. Tradition had it that Stephanie would bring trays loaded with this special cookie to La Cuisine once a year, or maybe even twice, from the end of October through Thanksgiving. Then she would go into her Christmas Cookie Mode, which always was delicious. But pumpkin cookies would never be on the tray.

If you came to our Saturday Tastings when Stephanie was working, and it was one of those two months in the fall, we would always include these cookies with the star ingredients from our shop—India Tree Caster and Light Muscovado Sugar, Heckers Flour, and Nielsen Massey Vanilla Paste. Even when the shop closed and I was developing my plans for sharing our accumulated knowledge of almost half a century, I received plaintive emails requesting that Joy’s Pumpkin Cookies be rescued from La Cuisine’s recipe archives. There are several versions of this cookie wandering around the internet ether, but in our minds, Joy’s version is the best, not only for technique but also for the ingredients. They matter too.

It’s Almost Always About Ingredients

You can make your own pumpkin purée from a Sugar Pie pumpkin or the Italian Marina di Chioggia, and there are readily available canned organic pumpkin purées. Do not use your Jack-o’-lantern pumpkin! I discovered Heckers Flour through Ina Garten. It is an excellent American flour that is non-GMO and proud of it. We and our customers found that it baked better than many other mainstream American flours. If you have access to maple sugar—I used to get mine from India Tree because it is finely milled—use half maple sugar and half India Tree Light Muscovado Sugar for the cookie batter and the frosting. This variation just takes this yummy cookie to a celestial level.

We found, and so did our customers, that the Nielsen Massey Madagascar or Tahitian Vanilla Bean Paste was an excellent substitute for the hassle of finding good-quality vanilla beans. You use it on a one-for-one basis. In other words, 1 vanilla bean would equal 1 tablespoon of vanilla bean paste. Madagascar is less fruity and floral than the Tahitian version. Stephanie always decorated her cookies with chopped toasted pecans and a sprinkling of large-grained orange decorating sugar, also from India Tree. Orange sprinkles would give a nice Halloween or fall look too. A little mise-en-place advice: get your decorations ready and pecans chopped and toasted before you bake. The frosting will stiffen once cooled, but you can keep it in a bain-marie—another bowl with hot water—so that it stays soft while you apply the “penuche” and then your decorations.

So take this beloved recipe, check your cupboard for ingredients and decorations, and make this cookie like the Cuisinettes do as the weather turns crisp and the leaves fall. This cookie has the Cuisinette Guarantee as the best in show!

Recipe

Joy's Pumpkin Cookies

Probably the most famous Cuisinette cookie ever. Stephanie got the recipe from her friend Joy.

Print Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 cup(200gr) cane sugar, preferably caster
• 1 cup (225gr) pumpkin puree (organic if possible, but not pumpkin pie filling)
• 1 cup (225gr) unsalted butter
• 1 large egg at room temperature ( 65gr in the shell)
• 1 tsp (4gr) Bakewell Cream Baking Powder
• 1 tsp (3gr) baking soda
• 1 tsp (2.3gr) cinnamon
• 1tsp (5gr) Madagascar Vanilla Bean Paste, failing that, a good quality vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon (12gr) fine sea salt
• 2 cups (240gr) all purpose flour, (unbleached, unbromated Hecker's Flour is a good example)

For the frosting

• 6 tbs (85gr)unsalted butter
• 1 cup (200gr)Light Muscovado Sugar (if you have, 1/2 cup fine maple sugar & 1/2 cup Light Muscovado sugar it kicks the frosting up a notch or two)
• 1/2 cup (119gr)heavy cream
• 1 tsp (5gr) Madagascar Vanillla Bean Paste or Tahitian Vanilla
• 2 cups (240gr) powdered sugar

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350F
2. If using decors, and chopped toasted pecans, prep them now so that they can be applied quickly to the frosting while it is soft.
3. Cream together sugar, butter until smooth and creamy Cream in the pumpkin puree, egg and vanilla - the mixture will look a bit curdled, which is fine.
4. Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt
5. The above can be done with a pastry blender in a bowl instead of sifting.
6. Add dry mixture to creamed mixture and mix until thoroughly combined.
7. Drop by 1.25" scoop onto a Silpat or baking parchment, placed on a cookie sheet, or you can pipe with a pastry bag and a large plain tube.
8. Bake for 10-12 minutes until the top springs back to the touch.
9. For the frosting, mix first three ingredients in a saucepan, over low heat, until the sugar has completely dissolved and the mixture is smooth.
10. Remove from heat and grdaually add the powdered sugar. and vanilla. Beat with a hand mixer until frosting reaches a smooth spreading consistency..
11. Cookies should be frosted while warm and the frosting (which is like a penuche) will set as they cool.
12. Toast roughly chopped pecans and add with sparkling sugar or decors, or demerara sugar onto warm, but not hot frosting.

Notes

• Warning: make a double batch!
• Cookies freeze beautifully, even when frosted.
• Decorate with India Tree Orange sparkling sugar,or their Natural Orange Sprinkles and crushed pecans for added appeal.
• I recommend India Tree sugars, a Europrean style butter (less moisture) to make this the superior cookie it deserves to be.
• Hecker;s Flour, while not organic is a superior domestic all purpose flour
• If you are making this batter into bars (like brownies to be frosted later with the penuche icing), omit the baking powder and soda so that the base is not too cake like. .
• If you make the frosting first, apply to the warm cookie and it will melt a bit.
• If you make the frosting while the cookie bakes, frosting can be hot on cool cookies or cold on warm cookies.

Details

Author: Stephanie Gorenflo