Pumpkin Passion

I’ve already ruined my personal goal of posting a blog entry every Monday for all of the 2008 Pumpkin Eatin’ Season. My excuse is as follow: Last week was the craziest work week ever in my entire working life. I could have used a case of pumpkin wine and have still not forgotten my troubles. It feels a little like the sky is falling and my only hope is that on November 5th we’ll see some actual change.

To forget my troubles, I’ve recently had some excellent pumpkin filled weekends . . . . . but for this post I’m forgoing the excellent. Oftentimes, I’m quick to post about the really awful pumpkin finds or the really awesome pumpkin finds. The mediocre ones get pushed to the side and forgotten. Not this time! This is my mediocre pumpkin post.

First off….

Name: Jack’s Pumpkin Whoopie
Purchased At: West Coast Whoopies in Calimesa, CA
Price: $2.50
Availability: Year Round

From the first moment I was told about Whoopies I’ve wanted to try them. The one thing I possibly love almost as much as pumpkins are cupcakes and since Whoopies are a variation on the cupcake I was totally excited to hear about them. A Whoopie is like a crème-filled cookie but it’s more like if you took the tops off two cupcakes and used them for the cookies but put the frosting in the middle, which sounds great. The only thing wrong with cupcakes are the wrappers and this eliminates that step.

We set out to get ourselves a Whoopie and when we pulled up to the shop I noticed the sign outside read PUMPKIN Whoopies. Yea! We got one pumpkin and one chocolate with peanut butter frosting. I took a bite of the chocolate one right outside of the shop but was unimpressed. They seemed dry and ordinary. The pumpkin Whoopies are frozen so we decided to take them home and have them later in the day.

I was hoping that my patience would be rewarded but it wasn’t. They aren’t horrible but they’re nothing special. They made the classic mistake of using a vanilla cream cheese frosting, which I have bemoaned frequently on this blog, and the cake was dry and uneventful.

Yawn, we probably won’t be going back but it did spawn the idea that if I’m going to ask the bakers of the world to STOP using cream cheese frosting then I have to come up with an alternative. Keep watching because I’m going to try out a variety of frosting recipes until I come up with the perfect one for pumpkin cupcakes.

Rating: 2 out of 5

Name: Phenomenal Pumpkin Spice Cookie
Purchased At: Nearly Every Independent Coffee Shop in Southern California
Price: $3.00ish
Availability: Year Round

I buy the “Phenomenal Pumpkin Spice” (their use of the term “phenomenal,” not mine) cookies made buy the Alternative Baking Company too often. I see them year round and I’m always thinking that I really should blog about them but they’re just too boring to say much about. The taste is decently pumpkinish but the cookie ends up feeling like a ball of lead in my stomach. It’s probably because it’s vegan but the texture is Dense with a capital “D.” Another mark against it is that one cookie has 440 calories and it is sooo not worth it.

Rating: 2 out of 5

Name: Mini Pumpkin Pie
Purchased At: Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf
Price: $2.25
Availability: Seasonal

The mini pumpkin pie at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf looked cute in the pastry case but was a yawner. It’s mostly crust and the dollop of whipped cream is rubbery and artificial.

Rating: 2 out of 5

Name: Pumpkin Latte
Purchased At: Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf
Price: $3.75
Availability: Seasonal

It tasted better than the Starbucks’ version but not by much.

Rating: 3 out of 5

Name: Pumpkin Loaf
Purchased At: Starbucks
Price: Forgotten
Availability: Seasonal

There is nothing new at Starbucks in the way of pumpkin treats. It’s all the same old stuff that they’ve had for the past few years. Maybe they think they can trick us into thinking the pumpkin loaf is new because this year because they put crushed pumpkin seeds on top instead of the cream cheese frosting with the tiny candied ginger pieces like every other year but it’s soo not new. I prefer it the old way.

Blah, Blah, Blah . . . it’s fine but boring.

Rating: 2 out of 5

Wow! I’m kind of caught up now. I’ve also made some great pumpkin finds and I’ll post them soon. Hopefully you are still awake after all this boredom.

I found this treasure in my inbox a few days ago. Now if I could just find it in my grocer’s freezer! Here’s the word from the Ben & Jerry’s website:

Fall is right around the corner. Doesn’t it make you start craving foods like apple cider, butternut squash, and Pumpkin Cheesecake!? That’s right!

This favorite seasonal flavor can be found in select retail stores for a limited time.

Name: Pumpkin Empanada
Purchased At: La Fuente
Price: $.60
Availability: Not Sure

I recently moved from my city of the last ten years, Long Beach, CA, to the Inland Empire. If you’re not familiar with these two places let me paint you a picture: Long Beach is a large urban beach town that is strongly liberal and has an ultra adorable gay ghetto; The Inland Empire is practically the desert, is hotter than freaking hot all the time, has probably never been called “ultra adorable,” is majorly conservative, and we’ve already had a “Yes on 8″ flyer put on our door.

As a result, I was feeling a little homesick and wondering if I would ever adjust to this strange place when I asked Shannon if there was a place to get Mexican pastries. She took me to La Fuente, a bakery/food-to-go in San Bernardino that, in addition to selling pastries, has tamales (that are supposedly really good) menudo, rellenos, and tortillas.

I’d been waiting for a few days to get my pastry because the first time we went there was a big sign on the door saying “Back on September 1st.” Well, I was back on September 1st early in the morning to find cases of yummy looking stuff. I had a difficult time not getting one of every thing.

On the back side of one of the case were the empanadas and on the bottom shelf was a pumpkin empanada! Here it was, the first day of Pumpkin Eatin’ Season, and I’d found my first product and it was in my new hometown. I was so excited.

I can’t help but compare this empanada with the last pumpkin empanada I had at Starbucks. This one was simpler with no cinnamon sugar baked on top and the crust was moist rather than flakey. However, the biggest difference was in the filling. The pumpkin filling was simple yet delicious. If there was any cinnamon or nutmeg in the filling it was minimal and there was not artificial aftertaste like the one at Starbucks, which doesn’t look like it will be back this year.

It was pointed out to me that this was their first day back from vacation so everything was probably made that morning. The pastries were certainly fresh and delicious!

Rating: 4 out of 5

I still give it only a 2.

Name: Three Lakes Winery’s Pumpkin Wine
Purchased At: It was a gift
Price: $9.95
Availability: Seasonal

I’ve always considered September 1st to be the official kick-off to Pumpkin Eatin’ Season. To celebrate the arrival of another pumpkin season, I would like to propose a toast with Three Lakes Winery’s Pumpkin Wine. WTF, did I say pumpkin wine? Yup, I did.

This was given to me by a friend from work who also deserves a toast because he was married over Labor Day weekend. Congratulations Andrew! I wish you nothing but happiness. He got it for me on a trip to Chicago but if I’m not mistaken it was purchased on a drive to Milwaukee at a location I can’t remember.

The Three Lakes Winery is located in Three Lakes Wisconsin and specializes in fruity dessert-like wine. They have other interesting flavors like blueberry, cranberry, and apricot. The website says that the pumpkin wine was originally made only for the Three Lakes’ PumpkinFest. They currently offer it in limited quantities during the fall season.

The winery describes the pumpkin wine as “It IS actually made only from pie pumpkins, and the smooth, pleasant flavor surprises all who try it at our Tasting Counter because it DOESN’T taste like pumpkin pie. It has been described as having qualities of a semi-sweet Chardonnay, and we have yet to find another Pumpkin Wine made by anyone.” Well, they weren’t kidding about the “DOESN’T taste like pumpkin pie.” Unless you saw the bottle, you would never know it was made from pumpkins but I can’t really begrudge them. Pumpkins don’t have a particularly strong taste. However, I wouldn’t have described it as a semi-sweet wine. It’s really sweet but I like sweet wines.

I shared it with three other people. One person hated it and described it as GROSS (she’s super picky) but everyone else, including myself, gave it was a lukewarm good. It tastes different than what you’d expect. There’s an indescribable aftertaste that isn’t bad but not great either. It only took one glass to get my cheeks red and to make me a tad bit tipsy.

I think the novelty factor of serving a pumpkin wine at Thanksgiving or at a fall dinner party is this wine’s best asset. I would purchase and drink this wine again but it’s not something I’ll hope becomes available all year round.

Rating: 3 out of 5