Iced Pumpkin Cookies

We’ve already established that pumpkin is delicious (see previous post). And who could argue that cookies are not also delicious? Therefore pumpkin cookies must be great! At least that’s what I thought when I saw this recipe. And to top it all off, these cookies are iced. Icing on the cake..er cookie :)

These cookies bring back a dear memory from when Joe and I were dating long distance. I drove to visit Joe for the weekend in Michigan. He decided to surprise me with a home cooked meal, including these tasty pumpkin cookies! I was so impressed. Joe doesn’t choose to cook very often...almost never actually. So the gesture was even sweeter. When I walked into his apartment he was a little….frazzled. He was attempting to bring the meal together. He had chicken in the oven and a few side dishes going on the stove top. I gladly stepped in to assist :) He felt bad because I had to help, but I couldn’t help but love the whole situation just as it was. Anyways, these cookies remind me of that day and my thoughtful husband :)

This was my first time making them. Pumpkin muffins kind of dominated our pumpkin desserts last fall. But I came across this recipe (that he had printed off and saved) the other day and decided to give it a go.

They’re very easy to quickly mix up, and they made the apartment smell delicious! No tricky steps in this recipe. Cough. Thinking about you, beating egg whites to stiff peaks.  Cough. Man I hate that. Anyone else struggle with that? Please say I’m not the only one.

The batter is pretty sticky. I found it easiest to use my cookie dough scoop to get the batter to drop nicely onto the baking sheet.

They also baked much faster than the recipe said, so keep an eye on them. The recipe says 15min, but I found 12min was perfect.

The icing is also very simple. I used a fork to mix it up, and a spoon to frost the cookies. Some of the icing will run off the cookies, so put some wax paper under your cooling rack. That way you can scoop some of the excess up and ice them some more. I usually make a half batch of most recipes, since it’s just the two of us, but they are almost gone a day after I made them...so next time I’ll make the whole recipe :D

The goods:

½ cup butter softened (try not to microwave if you can avoid it. Sitting out on the counter is best)

1 ½ cups white sugar

1 cup canned pumpkin puree

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 ½ cups flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

½ tsp ground nutmeg

½ tsp ground cloves

½ tsp salt

for the glaze:

2 cups confectioners sugar

3 tablespoons milk

1 tablespoon butter, melted

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350. Cream the butter and sugar until fluffy. Beat in the egg, pumpkin, and vanilla until creamy and dreamy. In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients- flour, powder, soda, spices and salt. Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. The batter will be pretty sticky. That’s okay. Drop by spoonfuls (or use cookie dough scoop) onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake for about 15min or until toothpick inserted comes out clean. Let them cool and then glaze them.

To make the glaze: combine all ingredients with a fork and drizzle over cookies. You can add more milk if you want it to be more runny. Add more powdered sugar if you want it thicker. And then eat them! Oh and share them too..