Munchkin and Bean: Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

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It's October. Finally. That means it's pumpkin season! And it just so happens that pumpkins are delicious as cookies. Especially with chocolate chips mixed in! The kids love helping out in the kitchen. They are fascinated and love watching me cook at the stove. They love helping to mix and stir and add ingredients. And baking is a perfect way to let them help out in the kitchen!

You could easily make this recipe in a mixer, but we like to stir everything by hand! The kids really love to stir, so I let them take their time. This is also great practice for them and helps with fine motor development. They are also learning math when they measure out ingredients, although they don't know it.

First, leave out your butter for a short while. The butter needs to be at room temperature (basically soft). Mix together 1 cup (2 sticks) of butter and 3/4 cup of canned pumpkin (100% pumpkin, NOT pumpkin pie filling). Doesn't it look great? The kids seriously thought this was going into a sensory bin and then I said - Oh, no, this is for cookies! And they became very engaged and eager to help.

Once the butter and pumpkin is thoroughly mixed together (I helped a bit), add in 1 cup light brown sugar and 1/2 cup granulated sugar until evenly combined.

Oh yeah, it looks lovely.

Then mix in an egg (we cracked it in a seperate bowl because Bean wanted to practice cracking them - she washed her hands afterwards before continuing to help mix), 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract, 1 teaspoon of baking soda, 1 teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice and 1 teaspoon of salt until thoroughly combined.

Then mix in 2 1/2 cups of flour. Ok, now it looks like normal dough, right?

Ok, now add in the best ingredient - chocolate chips!! 2 cups, to be precise. But add in as much you want! (Chocolate chip cookies are mommies favourite!) Though Bean will argue that pumpkin in the best ingredient. They certainly do make these cookies delicious!! We use semi-sweet, though you can use whatever chocolate morsels you prefer.

As Bean would say - "OM NOM NOM." (Although she was very sad that I wouldn't let her lick the spoon, so I whipped up a tiny batch of no-bake eggless cookie dough for them to enjoy while we waited for the cookies to bake.)

Then came Munchkin's favourite part - spooning the cookie dough onto a baking sheet. (Put down a sheet of parchment paper first.) They took turns spooning the dough onto the baking sheet. When they baked, they only went down slightly and basically kept the same shape. So if you are very particular about what they look like, roll them into balls first and flatten them.

This recipe made 42 cookies.

Bake them in a preheated oven at 350 for 9-11 minutes (although we actually cooked them for 12-13 minutes - we like crunchy cookies... but overnight in a Tupperware and they were super soft by morning!).

These cookies were SO GOOD! I am not even a big fan of pumpkin (I can't handle pumpkin pie *gasp*) but I did enjoy these cookies!

Ok, here's the short version -

1 cup butter, room temperature
3/4 cup canned pumpkin
1 cup light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 tsp salt
2 1/2 cups flour
2 cups chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350°
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
In a bowl mix together the butter and pumpkin until thoroughly combined.
Add both sugars and mix together.
Add the egg, vanilla, baking soda, pumpkin pie spice and salt. Mix together until smooth.
Add in flour. Mix together.
Then stir in chocolate chips and mix until well combined.
Use a spoon (tablespoon) to scoop and drop dough onto lined baking sheet and bake for 9-11 minutes until centers are just set and edges are golden.
Allow to cool for 3-4 minutes on a baking sheet and then transfer to wire rack to continue cooling.

We also made Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins with the remaining can of pumpkin!