A pumpkin recipe! Rarely do I share pumpkin recipes because I get overwhelmed by all the pumpkin recipes that surface the internet during the fall months and pumpkin just isn’t my favourite ingredient. Don’t get me wrong, I love using kabocha squash (or Japanese pumpkin) in a lot of my cooking and baking — kabocha cheesecake cream puffs, kabocha salted egg yolk sesame balls, and kabocha mooncakes —but I’ll always choose kabocha over pumpkin for both flavour and texture. These pumpkin mochi cakes might be the only exception.

These 3-ingredient mochi cakes call for canned pumpkin purée (not pumpkin pie filling) that one would use to make pumpkin pie or muffins. It’s a great way to use up any pumpkin purée you have leftover from other fall baking projects. Because there are no eggs involved, you can easily scale the recipe up (to make 20 mochi cakes) or down (to make 4 mochi cakes). Glutinous rice flour, or sweet rice flour, is added to the pumpkin purée to create the base of the mochi dough. It’s important to get glutinous rice flour and not just regular rice flour so you get the chewy, sticky mochi texture. Granulated sugar is added to the mixture for a bit of sweetness and you can leave it at that if you like. I normally make it a plain pumpkin mochi but if I’m feeling fancy, I will make a simple 4-ingredient brown sugar filling (making this a 7-ingredient recipe!) for the mochi. The brown sugar filling is warm and sweet, much like the filling for a brown sugar pop tart. The mochi cakes are pan fried, giving them a crispy, golden exterior while the centres remain soft and chewy. Mochi cakes are best consumed right after they are made by you can reheat them on the pan until they get soft again.

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Crispy Pumpkin Mochi Cakes (3-Ingredients)

These pumpkin mochi cakes are crispy, tender, and chewy! They only require 3-ingredients: pumpkin purée, glutinous rice flour, amd sugar. The mochi cakes are pan fried, giving them a crispy, golden exterior while the centres remain soft and chewy. Because there are no eggs involved, you can easily scale the recipe up or down.

Servings 12 mochi cakes

Author Amy

Ingredients

Pumpkin Mochi

• 300 g (1 1/4 cup) pumpkin purée
• 260 g (2 cups and 3 tbsp) glutinous rice flour
• 50 g (1/4 cup) granulated sugar

Brown Sugar Filling (Optional)

• 67 g (1/3 cup) brown sugar
• 3 g (1 1/2 tsp) all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp salt

Instructions

Brown Sugar Filling (Optional)

• Whisk together ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.

Pumpkin Mochi

• In a large bowl, combine pumpkin purée, glutinous rice flour, and sugar with a rubber spatula, mixing until smooth. The mixture will resemble play-doh. If the mixture is too sticky, add more glutinous rice flour, one tablespoon at a time.
• Divide the dough into 12 equal portions and roll each portion into a ball between the palms of your hands.
• Using your knuckle, create an indent at the centre of mochi dough. Add 1 – 2 teaspoons of filling to the centre and pinch the dough to seal the filling.
• Flatten the filled dough ball between the palms of your hands. Using the dull side of a butter knife, create marks on the side of the mochi to create the shape of a pumpkin. Repeat with remaining dough balls
• Heat up a nonstick pan on medium heat. Brush on a thin layer of vegetable oil to the pan.
• Add mochi cakes to the heated pan. Fry mochi cakes until golden, about 2 – 3 minutes. Using a spatula, flip the mochi cakes over.
• Add 1/4 cup of water to the pan and add a lid to the pan, this will allow the mochi to steam and get tender. Leave lid on for 2 minutes. Remove lid and allow any remaining water to evaporate. Fry the mochi for additional 2 – 3 minutes until mochi cakes are golden and crispy.
• Optional: add a pumpkin seed or pistachio for the 'stem' of the pumpkin mochi.

The post Crispy Pumpkin Mochi Cakes (3-Ingredients) appeared first on Constellation Inspiration.

I’m finally resurfacing from the chaotic baking season of Mid-Autumn Festival, where I baked so many mooncakes and filmed so many mooncake-making tutorials for Instagram and Tiktok. It’s hard to find baking inspiration after a big holiday because I go 110% leading up to the holiday and I’m out of both motivation and unsalted butter shortly after the holiday passes. I’m back now and I have been recipe testing lots of pumpkin things behind the scenes as well as working on a lot of fall cookie decorating ideas that I can’t wait to share with you. I’m still contemplating whether I’m going to do a haunted gingerbread house this year (because I don’t think I can top last year’s gingerbread pumpkin stand) — semi stay tuned? For now I’m excited to share a pumpkin sugar cookie recipe that is versatile for many different types of bakes during the fall season. I’ve used it to make these iced sugar cookie ghosts and pumpkins as well as a pumpkin sandwich cookie with nutella cheesecake filling (!!) that I will be sharing soon.

This pumpkin sugar cookie recipe is great for making cut-out cookies with your favourite cookie cutter. The dough comes together really easily and you don’t need a mixer to make it. It doesn’t spread much but I do recommend chilling your cookie cutouts before baking to make sure the cookies retain their shape as much as possible.

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Pumpkin Cut-Out Sugar Cookies

This pumpkin sugar cookie recipe uses both pumpkin purée and warm pumpkin pie spices. It's great for making cut-out cookies with your favourite cookie cutter. The dough comes together really easily and you don't need a mixer to make it. It doesn't spread much but I do recommend chilling your cookie cutouts before baking to make sure the cookies retain their shape as much as possible.

Servings 15 cookies

Author Amy

Ingredients

Pumpkin Cut-Out Sugar Cookies

• 70 g (1/4 cup) pumpkin purée
• 150 g  (2/3 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 50 g (1/4 cup) granulated sugar
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 160 g (1 1/3 cup) all-purpose flour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger
• 1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1/8 tsp ground cloves

Royal Icing

• 240 g (2 cups) icing sugar
• 4 – 5 tbsp water
• 1 1/2 tbsp meringue powder

Instructions

Pumpkin Cut-Out Sugar Cookies

• Preheat oven to 350F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Set aside.
• Between two sheets of paper tower, pat pumpkin purée dry. Removing the excess moisture will allow the cookies to crisp up more. After patting dry the initial 70g of pumpkin will reduce down to around 50g.
• In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream together on medium speed butter and granulated sugar, about 1 minute.
• Add pumpkin purée and vanilla to the butter-sugar mixture and mix until smooth.
• In a bowl, whisk together flour, spices, and salt. Add to the mixing bowl and mix on low speed until just combined, about 30 seconds
• Lay down a piece of parchment paper and transfer dough to the parchment.
• Lay a second piece of parchment over the dough and roll out dough to 1/4-inch in thickness. (Using two pieces of parchment eliminates the need to add extra flour to the dough)
• If the dough is too soft or is sticking to the parchment paper at this point, transfer the rolled out dough to firm up in the refrigerator for 15 minutes.
• Using cookie cutters of choice, stamp cut outs.
• Transfer the cut outs to the lined baking sheet. Transfer baking sheet to refrigerator or freezer to chill cut outs until firm — this will prevent spreading.
• Bake for 13 – 15 minutes, until edges the bottom of each cookie is a golden brown.
• Wait 10 minutes before transferring cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.

Royal Icing

• Combine icing sugar, meringue powder, and water in a large bowl. Using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, beat icing ingredients together first on low speed before gradually increasing to high speed for 1 – 2 minutes. If the icing too thick, beat in more water 1 tablespoon at a time. If royal icing is too thin, continue beating it to introduce more air OR add more icing sugar.
• Colour royal icing with food colouring of choice and transfer the coloured icing to piping bags.

Assembly

• Transfer royal icing to a shallow bowl or plate.
• Dip cooled sugar cookies into the royal icing and allow any excess to drip off.
• Before the icing dries, dip the cookie into a shallow bowl of coarse sanding sugar.
• Allow icing to dry for 10 – 15 minutes and use coloured royal icing to decorate the face.

The post Pumpkin Cut-Out Sugar Cookies appeared first on Constellation Inspiration.

I feel like I’m stuck in this weird phase in between two major themed baking holidays — Halloween and Christmas. Is it too late to still share pumpkin recipes? Are we still into fall baking while slowly listening to more Christmas music everyday? Or is it okay as long as I do it before December 1? I’m going to leave you with the recipe for these kabocha cheesecake cream puffs and you can take what you need.

Kabocha squash is one of my favourite things to eat, whether it’s in a sweet or savoury preparation. I had a phase in my life where I would eat the squash everyday and part of almost every meal — it was a wild time. I don’t eat it nearly as much now but still really enjoy a kabocha filled chewy rice cake from one of my go-to bakeries in Chinatown, in the form a pumpkin croquette at Japanese restaurants, and my mom’s kabocha cream soup whenever I go home for dinner. I also love using kabocha in a few of my recipes including kabocha salted egg yolk mooncakes during Mid-Autumn Festival, taro coconut sago dessert soup (I add cubes of kabocha!), as well as subbing kabocha for yam in these dessert cups with grassy jelly. If you have a recipe you love making that features kabocha squash, please share it with me! In the meantime, I hope you love these pumpkin-shaped kabocha cheesecake cream puffs.

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Kabocha Cheesecake Cream Puff

Kabocha squash is one of my favourite things to eat, whether it's in a sweet or savoury preparation. These pumpkin-shaped cream puffs feature a light choux pastry with a crispy craquelin top filled with a subtly sweet whipped  kabocha cheesecake filling. I used some extra whipped cream for garnish to really make it look like a little pumpkin.

Servings 10 cream puffs

Author Amy

Ingredients

Craquelin

• 25 g (2 tbsp) unsalted butter softened
• 25 g (2 tbsp) brown sugar
• 25 g (4 tbsp) all-purpose flour
• A few drops of orange food colouring optional

Pâte à Choux

• 57 mL (1/4 cup) water
• 57 mL (1/4 cup) whole milk
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 57 g (1/4 cup) unsalted butter
• 70 g 1/2 cup and 2 tbsp all-purpose flour
• 110 g (~2 1/2) large eggs lightly beaten

Kabocha Cheesecake Filling

• 210 g (1 cup) kabocha squash steamed and mashed
• 226 g (1 block) cream cheese room temperature
• 240 g (1 cup) heavy whipping cream
• 60 g (1/2 cup) confectioner's sugar

Instructions

Craquelin

• In a medium bowl, combine all ingredients and mix with rubber spatula until smooth.
• Roll out the craquelin dough to 1/8-inch in thickness. Use a cookie cutter and cut out 10 2-inch circles. Set aside.

Pâte à Choux

• Preheat oven to 350F.
• In a saucepan, combine the water, milk, sugar, salt, and butter. Bring to a light boil, remove from heat, and immediately add in all the flour. Quickly stir in the flour, using a rubber spatula, and return saucepan back over medium-high heat.
• Continue to stir the mixture, without stopping, until the paste is smooth, about 1-2 minutes. It will pull away from the sides of the pan and leave a thin coating of cooked paste on the bottom when ready. The texture should resemble dry mashed potatoes.
• Transfer the paste to a stand mixer bowl fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on low for the choux to cool down.
• While the mixer is running on medium, gradually stream in the lightly beaten eggs. Mix until well combined.
• Transfer the pâte à choux to the prepared piping bag with a round tip. Pipe out 10 choux mounds onto the prepared baking sheet, leaving roughly 2 inches between each puff. If you are making choux with a craquelin top, this is when you want to add the craquelin to the choux mounds.
• Place the baking sheet in the oven and immediately bake choux puffs for 35 minutes. Rotate the baking sheet and turn down the oven to 325F, then bake for 10 minutes more until choux are deeply golden. Remove from oven and set on cooling rack to cool.

Kabocha Cheesecake Filling

• Steam kabocha squash until fork tender. Remove the skin before mashing with a fork. Allow mashed kabocha to cool completely before using for the filling.
• In a bowl of a standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment, whisk heavy whipping cream until medium peaks form, about 2-3 minutes. Transfer whipped cream to another bowl. (If decorating cream puffs to look like a pumpkin, reserve 3 tablespoons of whipped cream to use at garnish)
• In a bowl of a standing mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat cream cheese on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 2-3 minutes. Add confectioner's sugar and beat until combined.
• With a rubber spatula fold in whipped cream into cream cheese mixture.
• Fold in cooled and mashed kabocha with a spatula into fully incorporated.
• Transfer mixture to a piping bag fitting with an open star tip.

Assembly

• Cut off the top of the choux with a serrated knife.
• Pipe the choux cavity with kabocha cheesecake filling.
• Top cream puff with other choux half like a hat.
• Optional: pipe a few squiggles of green whipped cream for the vine.
• Serve immediately.

Notes

I used 1/2 cup of confectioner’s sugar for the filling but you can add more if you prefer the filling to be a bit sweeter. My kabocha squash was pretty sweet already so I found 1/2 cup to be perfect.

The post Kabocha Cheesecake Cream Puffs appeared first on Constellation Inspiration.

In case you missed it, I’m now a Halloween enthusiast (contrary to what I said before) and I wish I started celebrating all things spooky (but only the cute kind of spooky) earlier. To make up for lost spooky time, I’ll be sharing an excessive amount of Halloween thing here. In my opinion, the best thing about Halloween baking is how over the top the decorations can be. Today’s post is less of a recipe post because I encourage you to use your favourite sugar cookie recipe, and more of a decorating inspiration. Instead of a recipe, I’m sharing my favourite decorating tools for make a set of killer () haunted cookies.

Friendly ghost sugar cookies: ghost cookie cutter, coarse sanding sugar
Mummy brown sugar cookies: cookie cutter of choice, flat piping tip (Wilton #45), eyeball sprinkles
Graveyard sugar cookies: cookie cutter of choice, grass tip (Wilton #233), assorted spooky sprinkles
Slime cookies: cookie cutter of choice, eyeball sprinkles, assorted sprinkles
Chocolate cookies: eyeball sprinkles

If you’re looking for a good sugar cookie recipe to use as the foundation for these Halloween cookies, you can find my favourite sugar cookie recipe here. If you’re looking for a less traditional recipe, I love these pretzel shortbread cookies. Both these recipes produce cookie doughs that don’t spread much, which is ideal for cut-out cookies! To make sure all the cookies retain their shape, I like to make sure the cookie dough is throughly chilled before baking.

Happy baking!

The post Halloween Cookie Decorating Ideas appeared first on Constellation Inspiration.

If you have been here before, you will most likely know that I live for gingerbread structures.

Exhibit A: Gingerbread greenhouse 2019
Exhibit B: Gingerbread greenhouse 2020 (and how we got there )
Exhibit C: Chocolate gingerbread workshop 2020

I’m extremely excited to add to this collection ahead of the holiday season this year with a gingerbread pumpkin farm stand for fall! I’ve never been much of a fall or Halloween baker but working on this was such a delight. Like with the previous gingerbread houses, the first thing you have to do is some math. I personally quite enjoy this part (lame, I know) and sketching out the dimensions and design on my notepad is kind of fun when you have a somewhat terrible fall-themed Hallmark movie playing in the background. The biggest decision I had to make was which part of the farm stand will have the ‘greenhouse’ elements because I wasn’t willing to give up using gelatin sheets to create a glass effect. Farm stands don’t normally have too many glass elements, but I decided that the main windows and roof panel will show off glass features. The door, which features an arch this year, will be left open. Compared to the past houses, this farm stand has significantly less windows and cut-outs, which makes this project much easier to execute compared to the holiday greenhouses from the previous years.

The technique remains pretty much the same:
• I used my favourite gingerbread recipe from Food52 (I halved the recipe)
• I sketched out my panels and measurements before cutting it out the shapes with the dough
• I decorated the panels before assembling because I want to have a flat surface for decorating
• I used gelatin sheets for the ‘glass’ elements (windows, roof panels, etc.)
• I allowed the assembled structure to dry overnight before moving it
• I remembered to not stress out too much because I’m suppose to be having fun with this project

Here is a sketch I made before starting the pumpkin farm stand:

In case you have trouble reading any of the handwriting, here are the measurements:
• FRONT PANEL: 9 x 6 inches
• FRONT PANEL WINDOW: 4.5 x 2.5 inches
• FRONT PANEL DOOR: 4 x 2 inches
• FRONT PANEL SMALL WINDOW: .75 x 2.5 inches
• FRONT PANEL WINDOW LEDGE: 4.5 x .25 inches
• FRONT PANEL STEPS (x2): 2 x .5 inches per step
• SIDE PANEL A (with awning): 6 x 6 inches
• SIDE PANEL A TAKEOUT WINDOW: 5.5 x 2.5 inches
• SIDE PANEL B (with two window panels): 6 x 6 inches
• SIDE PANEL B PANELS (x2): 1.5 x 5 inches per panel
• BACK PANEL: 9 x 6 inches
• BACK PANEL WINDOW: 7 x 2.5 inches
• BACK PANEL WINDOW LEDGE: 7 x .25 inches
• ROOF: 9 x 6 inches
• ROOF CUTOUTS (x4): 1.5 x 5 inches per panel
• SIGNAGE & PUMPKIN SHELVES: various sizes

For step-by-step instructions on how to construct intricate gingerbread houses and structures head over to my original post.

The post Gingerbread Pumpkin Farm Stand appeared first on Constellation Inspiration.

I think there are two groups of Halloween people – those who like the actual horror aspect of the holiday and will embark on scary-movie-marathons and voluntarily venture inside a haunted house and those who like the idea of super themed holiday but can only handle minimal Halloween motifs and will use any opportunity to turn scary Halloween characters into something cuter and more approachable. I am obviously in the latter.

Once I left the age bracket of what is socially acceptable to go trick or treating, I stopped celebrating Halloween. I do not love scary movies (the jump scares from Beetlejuice is the most I could handle) and there is no way I will voluntarily enter a haunted house attraction or a corn maze. The only way you can get me to do any Halloween-related activity is if Halloween-themed baking. I will never pass up any opportunity to make something look a bit cuter.

For Halloween this year, I am partnering with Williams Sonoma to make these spooky breakfast tarts with a simple brown sugar filling. I am sharing my favourite all-butter pie dough recipe for these breakfast tarts but you can always use store-bought pie dough in a pinch. I baked these breakfast tarts on the Goldtouch® Nonstick cookie sheet, which is truly -nonstick-. You can bake your little hand pies directly on the cookie sheet or you can line the baking sheet with a piece of parchment to make clean up even easier. Some of the brown sugar filling in the first batch escaped off the parchment and baked onto the cookie sheet but it came off easily with a wet paper towel.

What makes these Halloween breakfast tarts so fun is the decorating. I used a simple royal icing coloured with gel food colour to ice these pies and decorated with some fun candy eyeballs and sprinkles. I highly recommend decorating in a cooling rack with sheet pan underneath so any excess sprinkles will collect at the bottom and not get stuck to the sides of your breakfast tarts. Scroll to the end of the recipe to see some decorating ideas.

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Halloween Brown Sugar Breakfast Tarts

Servings 15 breakfast tarts

Author Amy

Equipment

• Goldtouch® Nonstick cookie sheet
• Goldtouch® Nonstick half sheet pan and cooling rack
• Cookie cutters of choice

Ingredients

• 1 batch all-butter pie dough
• 1 batch brown sugar filling
• Royal icing to decorate
• Sprinkles and candy eyeballs to decorate

All-Butter Pie Dough

• 2 1/2 cups (300 g) all-purpose flour
• 1 tbsp (13 g) granulated sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup (227 g) very cold unsalted butter, cut into 1⁄2-inch pieces
• 1 1/2 cup (120 ml) cold water
• 1 1/2 cup (110 g) ice cubes
• 1 tbsp (15 ml) apple cider vinegar or white vinegar

Egg Wash

• 1 large egg
• 1 tbsp (15 ml) whole milk

Brown Sugar Filling

• 2/3 cup (134g) brown sugar
• 1 tbsp (6g) all-purpose flour
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp salt

Royal Icing

• 2 cups (240 g) powdered sugar
• 2 tbsp (15 ml) whole milk or water
• Gel food coloring as needed (optional)

Instructions

All-Butter Pie Dough

• Make the all-butter pie crust. In a large bowl, stir together the flour, granulated sugar, and salt. Add the butter. With a pastry cutter or a fork, quickly cut the butter into the flour mixture until mostly pea-size pieces of butter remain (a few larger pieces are okay).
• In a large measuring cup or a small bowl, combine the water, ice, and vinegar. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons (15 ml) of the ice-water mixture over the flour mixture and mix with a spatula until the water is fully incorporated. Add more of the ice-water mixture, 1 to 2 tablespoons (15 to 30 ml) at a time.
• Using the spatula or your hands, mix until the dough comes together in a ball with some dry, shaggy bits remaining. Squeeze and pinch the dough with your fingertips to bring all the dough together, sprinkling dry bits with 1 to 2 tablespoons (15 to 30 ml) of the ice-water mixture, if necessary, to combine.
• Divide the dough into 2 portions. Shape each portion of dough into a flat disk, wrap each disk in plastic, and refrigerate the dough for at least 1 hour (or overnight), to give the dough time to rest.

Egg Wash

• In a small bowl, whisk together egg and milk. Set side.
• Brown Sugar Filling
• In a small bowl, whisk together the ingredients for the filling. Set aside.

To assemble

• Preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C). Line cookie sheet with parchment paper. The Goldtouch® Nonstick cookie sheet is super nonstick, but I like to still use a piece of parchment for easier clean up.
• On a floured work surface, roll out the disk of dough until it reaches 1⁄4 inch in thickness. Using cookie cutters of choice, stamp out an even number of shapes. Transfer half of the shapes to the cookie sheet.
• Using a pastry brush, brush a thin layer of egg wash to the cut outs on the cookie sheet. This will help seal the edges of the pies when baking.
• Place a spoonful of the brown sugar filling in the centers of half of the cut outs, about 2 teaspoons for smaller cut outs and 1 tablespoon for larger cut outs. Take a second cut out of the same shape and gently lay it on top of a filled cut out. Using the tines of a fork, press down on the edges to seal the hand pie. Once all the hand pies have been sealed, use the fork to prick holes in the tops to allow steam to escape during baking.
• Apply a thin layer of egg wash to the tops of each pie.
• Bake the hand pies for 24 to 28 minutes, until they are golden brown. Remove the hand pies from the oven and allow them to cool on the baking sheet for 10 minutes. Transfer the hand pies to a wire rack to cool completely before decorating

Royal Icing

• Make the royal icing glaze. In a medium bowl, whisk together the powdered sugar and milk/water. Add more milk if too thick or more icing sugar if too runny. You want the consistency to be similar to honey. Divide the royal icing into smaller bowls and colour the icing to desired colours.
• Using the back of a small spoon or with royal icing transferred to a piping bag, spread a thin layer of the royal icing glaze on each cooled hand pie. To garnish the hand pies, add sprinkles and candy eyes on top of the glaze before it sets.

Some decorating ideas:

1. Cute ghosts

2. Mummies

3. Classic Jack-o-lantern

4. Spooky slime

Happy baking!

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