Bah. Humbug. Ooo! Tasty!

I've been the unreformed Grinch this year. I just couldn't get into the Christmas spirit. It's the first year I didn't put up a tree.

I planned a haphazard dinner -- I was thinking fried chicken and my favorite roasted butternut squash ravioli. Coconut cupcakes and Brussels sprouts were late entries. Damn, I forgot to list the dressing, just like I forgot to put it in the oven before 6. It was from the Thanksgiving batch.

So when I got home from church, I had good intentions. I made my ice cream base (more about that in another post). I roasted my butternut squash, I brined the chicken. By then, it was nearly dark and what little enthusiasm I had for cooking left with the sunlight. What's a girl to do?

Ta-Daaaaaa! All the flavors of the ravioli without making pasta by hand.

Start with roasted butternut squash. Make sure it's caramelized.

In the meantime, mix heavy cream and mascarpone cheese until smooth. Season with salt, cinnamon, freshly ground black pepper and nutmeg. Add sprigs of time and rosemary. Simmer and reduce.

Boil some pasta. Orecchiette is great choice. 

Slosh in some sauce.

Garnish with toasted pecans, rosemary and sage. Delicious!!!

One final note. I have an announcement to make.  I believe in pretty chicken!

I'm going to kick back now and finish my glass of screw-top wine. (I'm running a quality establishment over here.)

Merry Christmas, y'all!

Ode to Vermont and Canada

I'm so not feeling the Christmas spirit this year. I want a shirt that says, "Bah. Humbug." However, the bright sunny morning cheered me a little and I decided to celebrate the first day of me not checking my Blackberry all day with some scones.  Not just any scones -- maple-glazed pumpkin scones to be exact. I wanted to make these over Thanksgiving, but a family emergency kept me from my kitchen most of my time off.

You've seen the scone recipe before, so let's get to it. It starts pretty much the same; pulse dry ingredients in the food processor.  Add cold butter.

Here's the departure:  make Trader's Joe's Pumpkin Butter your friend. Y'all might even be best friends after this :-)

Mix it into the cream really well. Instead of a full cup of cream, I used 3/4 C. Add the cream to the flour mixture. 

CI has you do this by hand, I just added mine to Miracle and pulsed until it formed a dough.

                                     

Now comes the messy part. Dump the dough on the counter. Knead very gently to incorporate all the dry bits. Form a ball or two, depending on how you will shape your scones.

I made two balls because I used a 6" cake pan so I could have mini scones.

Press the dough into the pan.

Invert.

Slice (do a better job than I did.) Remember to press straight down. I'll show you what happens later when you don't.

I did better on the second round.

I started with refrigerated instead of my usual frozen butter, so I parked these in the refrigerator while I took a bacon detour. 

I did say MAPLE pumpkin scones. No way I was going to have a hot oven, maple syrup on the counter and bacon in the refrigerator without making maple-glazed bacon again.

Back to the scones.  I heated some butter and maple syrup together.

I gave the scones a beautiful brush-on tan and to the oven they went.

Here's what I got.

Absolutely delicious! The texture was closer to a biscuit or even cake. I prefer my scones on the drier side, but the flavor made up for the break with tradition. The pumpkin butter was pretty sweet, so I would knock out some of the sugar when I try these again. The maple syrup kept the outside of the scones from getting hard, so next time, I'll make half with the glaze on before baking and put the glaze on the other half after baking to see which I like best. 

With Teavana's English Breakfast Tea, these made a wonderful morning treat. On a side note, here's another vote for Silpat -- the burnt syrup just flakes off. Easy cleanup.

Remember my note to press straight down when cutting? Here's what happens when you don't. He's all crooked :-( I'm working on a granite counter, so I use my bench scraper to cut dough. Moving to a cutting board so I can use my knives is too much work. And even still, I think it's just the way I cut and lack of wrist strength. I sometimes have lopsided biscuits too.

Tools of the trade

• Kitchenaid Food Processor
• Wilton Cake 6" Deep Pan
• 2-Cup Pyrex Measuring Cup
• Silpat
• OXO Pastry Brush
• OXO Bench Scraper