Pumpkin Bars

I decided to use my regular pumpkin bar recipe for my first batch of puree. I had found a pumpkin roll recipe in a magazine that garnered a lot of attention from some co-workers, but for the life of me, I can't find the magazine. I looked through 10 and can't find it. I was perusing other blogs and Monica at Lick the Bowl Good posted her puree the same day I did mine, and in her post she has a recipe for a pumpkin roll! That will be coming up in a week or so when Bob gets back to work from deer hunting.

Pumpkin Bars

2 cups pumpkin puree

2 cups sugar

4 eggs

1 cup salad (vegetable) oil

2 cups flour

2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

2 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. cloves

1 tsp. fresh ground nutmeg

Combine sugar, oil and eggs. Sift in dry ingredients and thoroughly combine. Stir in pumpkin. Spray jelly roll pan with cooking spray. Pour mixture into pan and bake for 25 minutes at 350 degrees F. When cool, top with your favorite cream cheese frosting.

You can substitute a can of pumpkin filling (not pie mix) as this is what the original recipe calls for. I think I got this from my grandma as it is an old recipe card, but to be honest, I have seen the same recipe in 3 of my cookbooks (I looked for pumpkin rolls in those too) with a little variation on spices and some have baking soda in them. It must be a tried and true recipe! I also baked mine in a 9x13 pan as I don't like to take frosted bars to work in a pan with no lid as the frosting will stick to foil or plastic wrap. I also used a commercial (canned) frosting as we don't always have room in the fridge at work for pans of treats so it had to sit on the counter and that could spell disaster with cream cheese.

Tofu kept me company at 4 in the morning when I was baking bars. She wasn't much help as you can see.