Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

I know many of you may be "pumpkined out" by this time in the fall, but if you've still got some pumpkin in your cupboard or refrigerator, this is a delicious recipe to tuck away in the freezer for a special holiday breakfast treat. I had a lot of pumpkin stored in the freezer from last fall, when I cooked down and froze some pureed pumpkin I made from the blue pumpkin in my front porch display. But you could certainly use canned pumpkin if you like.

The dough is easy to make. Roll out to about 12" x 9"

After smearing it with the butter/cinnamon/sugar mixture, roll it up tightly.

Pinch the edges and flip it over to have the smooth side on top.

Cut into twelve slices and trim off the ends. 

I  smooshed the end pieces together and baked it separately in a small oven proof container, as the cook's special treat - hey, I needed to do some quality control, right?

Place the 12 sliced rolls in a baking dish. You could also choose to make two round pans with six rolls in each pan.

Let them rise until nearly doubled in size.

Bake and let cool a little before slathering on the glaze. Or freeze unglazed as I did, reheat slightly in the oven and glaze when ready to serve. 

Check out Ciao Chow Linda on Instagram here to find out what’s cooking in my kitchen each day (and more).

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

(recipe from thefarmersdaughter.com)

Ingredients:

1/4 cup water

2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast 

1/4 cup white sugar (1 tablespoon for yeast mixture, 3 tablespoons in the rest of the dough)

3/4 cup pumpkin puree

1/4 cup butter

3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour (*important: don't add this all at once.  depending on your pumpkin puree thickness, and baking conditions, you may not need it all!)

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 egg

filling:

1 cup brown sugar, packed

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

1/2 cup butter, softened

Directions:

In a small bowl, add water, a tablespoon of white sugar, and yeast.  Stir together and set aside to rise.

In a small saucepan, stir together pumpkin puree and butter on a medium heat, stirring constantly.  Allow to cool slightly.

In a large mixing bowl, add 2 1/4 cups of flour, remaining 3 tablespoons of white sugar, and salt.  Stir in yeast and egg, and mix well.  Add in pumpkin and butter mixture.  Add in remaining cup of flour, 1/2 cup at a time (*note: you may not need all of the flour depending on the consistency of your pumpkin puree - you want your dough to pull away from the bowl, but not to get too dry.  A little stickiness is good as long as you can still work with it!)  Stir well until dough comes away from the sides of the bowl.

Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface, and knead for 5 minutes until smooth (again....it's better if you're dough's a little sticky here, rather than adding too much flour).

Cover with a clean, damp cloth, and let rest for 10 minutes.

Mix together the brown sugar, cinnamon, and soft butter.

Roll dough out into a 9x12 rectangle.

Spread butter-sugar mixture evenly across the dough.  Then, roll up the long side of the dough as tight as you can.  Pinch the seam where it ends, so that it doesn't come apart.  Use either a serrated knife to cut the roll into 12 even pieces, or you can use a piece of plain floss (slide it under the dough, bring it up, cross over each other, and cut).  

*Hint: I often trim the ends of the roll off and bake it in a mini pan to help the buns stay more even!

Arrange the twelve buns into a greased 9x13 pan.  Cover with a clean dish towel, and allow to rise for 30 minutes in a warm place.  (I let mine rise for nearly two hours.)  I placed any extra bits or warped rolls into a greased muffin tin.

Bake at 375 degrees F for 18-20 minutes.  

Allow to cool slightly before removing from pan/pie dish.  Best served warm with a glaze/icing.

Glaze/Icing

1 1/2 cup icing sugar

3 tablespoons butter (softened)

1/2 cup maple syrup

directions:

In a medium bowl, mix all ingredients together and adjust to taste/desired thickness.  Drizzle or spread over cinnamon rolls.  I like to soften my butter a lot, so it spreads on easy, and then will firm up.

Broiled Flounder with Romesco Sauce

We try to eat fish a couple of times a week, and flounder (or fluke here in New Jersey) is frequently in the rotation. Normally, I make it in a lemon/butter/caper sauce, but I wanted something different this time without fussing too much.

I love Romesco sauce, which is typically made with almonds, but if I have hazelnuts, I will substitute those instead. The sauce is delicious by itself with some crackers or pita bread, but I thought it would make a terrific base for a simple broiled fish. I was right. It was the perfect foil.

Make the Romesco just before you broil the fish since it only takes a few minutes for the fish to cook. While the Romesco sauce is fine eaten cold, it's more enjoyable (in my opinion) if you eat it either warm or at room temperature.

Prep the fish and have it read to pop in the broiler. Be careful to keep an eye on it. Mine was cooked in 5 minutes, but times vary, depending on thickness of the fish.

Swirl some of the Romesco sauce on the serving platter, place the fish on top, then sprinkle with some fresh herbs. Delicious enough for company, but easy enough for a mid-week family meal.

Check out Ciao Chow Linda on Instagram here to find out what’s cooking in my kitchen each day (and more).

Broiled Flounder with Romesco Sauce

Ingredients

For the broiled fish for two people:

3/4 to 1 pound of fresh flounder, fluke or sole

olive oil to smear on fish

salt, pepper

paprika

fresh thyme or parsley

For the Romesco sauce:

Adapted from Aliza Green’s Starting with Ingredients

(This will make enough for more than one meal for two people)

1 large roasted pepper (homemade or from a jar)

2 large cloves garlic

1/2 cup olive oil 
one half of a thick slice of Italian or French bread, crusts removed, and cut into cubes

1/2 cup hazelnuts, toasted and skins rubbed off (or use almonds if you prefer
1/2 teaspoon hot paprika

1/2 teaspoon sweet paprika

a dash of cayenne pepper

3 tablespoons sherry vinegar

salt to taste

Instructions:

For the fish:

Preheat broiler.

Place a sheet of parchment paper inside a pan. Be careful not to let any hang over the pan or it could burn and catch fire in the broiler.

Place the fish on the paper and smear with olive oil.

Sprinkle on the salt, pepper, and paprika.

Broil for a short time, depending on thickness of fish. Mine took only about 5 minutes.

For the Romesco sauce:

Puree the peppers and their juice in the bowl of a
food processor.  Without washing the bowl, transfer the paste to
a small pot and then cook slowly until it’s thick enough to hold its
shape, about 10 minutes.

Place the garlic and ½ cup of the olive oil
in a small pot and cook until the garlic is lightly browned, about 10
minutes. Add the cubed bread and cook 2 minutes longer or until lightly
browned.

Place the pepper paste, hazelnuts, and the garlic
and bread cubes and their cooking oil back into the food processor.
Process to a chunky paste, then add the Pimenton, sherry vinegar and
salt.

Process again, then drizzle the remaining olive oil
to make a thick sauce. Add a little water if it's too thick.

The second time I made it, I passed it through a sieve to make it even smoother, but that's not necessary if you want to make it easier on yourself.

Store in refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.