Punkinhead

The crisp, autumn weather has made me slightly obsessed with baking with pumpkin.  And now that the shortage is over, I don't even feel guilty about picking up some pumpkin puree at the store.  The great thing about pumpkins is that not only do they taste good, but they're also good for you...low in calories, lots of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants.  Anyway, I made some Pumpkin Chocolate-Chip Squares from a recipe on Martha Stewart's website.  I'm not sure why I keep using her recipes lately, but the bars were delicious.  They didn't taste too pumpkin-y and were very chocolatey.  The pumpkin added lots of moisture to the bars, so they didn't taste dry like blondies sometimes seem to be.  Here are some pictures:

Not wanting to leave anyone out, I also made some pumpkin dog treats.  The recipe came from The Organic Dog Biscuit Cookbook by Jessica Disbrow Talley and Eric Talley.  This was the first time I've ever made dog treats, although I'm not sure it really counts since I didn't use any scary ingredients (okay, really I just mean liver).    Here they are:

The dogs seemed to know the treats were for them and kept sniffing around the kitchen.  They were very satisfied when they finally got a treat!