Scribbles & Munch

      Why yes! Yes, that is what I made for breakfast on Thanksgiving Day! And they were - not to put too fine a point on it - scrump-diddily-umptious!

      They were an experiment with a most happy conclusion. As you may recall, I am one of the few citizens of the U.S.A. who does not like pumpkin pie, but that isn't to say I don't like pumpkin! So as a salute to that glorious orange gourd on this most thankful of days, I thought, "Huh...I need to make something for breakfast, don't I?"
      In my household we already have a favorite cinnamon roll recipe, one that involves Yukon Gold potatoes, which lend a marvelous tenderness and help the rolls stay moist for days (most cinnamon rolls, tragically, turn dry and tasteless within mere hours of baking). I was thinking about this recipe and I realized that pumpkin has a similar effect. I mean, have you ever had dry pumpkin bread? I sure haven't--if anything I've had the opposite, a baked pumpkin product that claimed to be bread but had a consistency more like bread pudding. So with this in mind, I decided to combine this two "P" products and see if I could start the day with something both delicious and calorie dense. Because, you know...there aren't enough calories in Thanksgiving dinner....
      Since the pumpkin wouldn't contain starch like the potatoes, I decided to swap out the Yukon Golds with a Russet potato. They're both starchier and easier to find. I also decided that canned pumpkin wouldn't have enough flavor at the end of the day, so I added a little pumpkin butter to the filling. That, and applying a cream cheese glaze instead of a regular milk icing (my husband would eat cream cheese frosting by the tub if permitted) made a fabulous final product. And best of all: these can be made the day ahead, enjoy their final rise in the fridge over night, and then be popped directly into the oven in the morning for a relatively brief baking time.
Enjoy!

Z.D.'s Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

Ingredients
For the Dough: 
1 medium Russet potato (1/2 lb), peeled and cut into 1.5 inch chunks
1 can pure pumpkin purée
1/2 Tablespoon kosher salt
1/2 Cup unsalted butter, room temp
3 large eggs
5 Cups AP flour, plus more for hands, divided
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 Cup warm water
2 scant Tablespoons yeast (about three envelopes)
2 Tablespoons sugar (I like vanilla sugar)

For the Filling:
1 Cup golden brown sugar, packed
2 Tablespoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
hefty pinch of ground cloves
7 Tablespoons unsalted butter (there's 8 in a stick, but you can use the spare to grease the bowl for the dough)
1/2 Cup pumpkin butter (Stonewall Kitchens makes a good one)

For the Icing:
4 oz cream cheese
4 Tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
1 Cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions
For the Dough:
 - Place the potato chunks in a medium pot with a cup of water. Add the salt, and bring to a boil. Boil uncovered until the potato is very tender, and most of the water has evaporated away, about 15 minutes (give or take). While this is boiling, coat the inside of a large bowl with butter (see note about leftover butter in the filling ingredients), and line a large rimmed baking pan with parchment paper (I used a 10" x 14" Pyrex baking dish).

 - Remove from heat, and mash the potato in the pot with the remaining water. Add in the pumpkin and mash until well combined. Add the butter and mash until the butter is entirely melted. Vigorously whisk in the eggs (the whites like to get lost, so be thorough), then add in one cup of the flour and the nutmeg, and mash until very smooth. Set this aside to cool.

 - Meanwhile, add the 1/2 Cup warm water to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Add both the yeast and the sugar to the water, stir just to mix, then allow to sit until the yeast becomes very foamy, about ten minutes.

Sorry, I forgot to take photos of the boiling potatoes & mashing process...but here's what your double-P mush looks like when you flop it into a bowl of foamy yeast liquid!

 - Scrape the pumpkin mixture into the mixer bowl, and beat on low speed until well mixed. Slowly add in three more cups of flour until well combined. Stop the mixer and change to a dough hook. Beat the dough on low speed as you add the remaining cup of flour, then up the speed and let the dough beat for about 4 - 5 more minutes. Dough still be sticky but elastic. (Alternatively to using the dough hook, you can dump about a half cup of flour onto a clean surface, scrape the dough onto it, and then knead with your hands. Keep adding the remaining flour as you go, for about 7 minutes, until the dough is thoroughly mixed--but I've always found this dough too sticky for that.)

Yeah, actually, I do NOT recommend kneading this by hand.

 - Turn the dough into your large, buttered bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and a tea towel, and set aside in a warm, draft-free place to rise for an hour. The dough will more than double in size.

For the Filling:
 - In a small bowl, mash together the butter, sugar, and spices until thoroughly combined in a dark brown paste.

As long as your butter is room temp, a simple fork will bring this together fast & easy.

 - Turn out your risen dough onto a well floured surface. Using your hands, press and flatten out the dough into a large rectangle, about 16 by 24 inches. With a pastry brush, spread the whole pastry rectangle with the pumpkin butter (this will be a thin coating).

So orange.

 - Sprinkle the spice butter in tiny blobs across the dough. Then, starting from one long side, roll the dough into a long log.

For rolling, I recommend starting in the middle. Roll a couple inches, then move your hands outward, rolling all the way until the edges are all caught up. Back to the middle, roll another couple inches, repeat. This keeps the dough from stretching into a weird, uneven worm at the end.

 - With a sharp knife, slice the log into 12 equal pieces. Place these round side down in your parchment lined baking dish in a rectangle, three-by-four. IF BAKING THE NEXT DAY, cover and stick in the fridge over night. IF BAKING TODAY, cover and allow to rise in a warm, draft-free area for another hour. Either way, these are some fluffy rolls when they're ready to bake. (Note: My lovely Pyrex comes with lids, so I just put the lid on my pan and stick 'em in the oven this way. If you don't have a lid, or if you're using a regular baking sheet, you're going to have to use a lot of plastic wrap, and you may want to either butter it or dust the tops of your rolls with flour, so they don't stick.)

I forgot the parchment paper. Don't forget the parchment paper.

 - Position an oven rack in the middle of the oven, and pre-heat to 425º F. If you have been fridging* over night, remove from the fridge while the oven preheats, so the pan can warm up a little. Once the oven reaches the proper temperature, remove the cover from the rolls and pop 'em in. Bake until the tops have golden brown tints, about 22 minutes.

These were actually that poofy before I put them in the oven--the over-night rise expands them considerably. Then they bake & just develop that lovely golden brown top!

For the Icing:
 - Remove the rolls from the oven and allow to cool for 8 minutes. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl combine all the icing ingredients. Beat together thoroughly with a hand mixer (or you can use a rubber spatula if you want an arm workout). Once the rolls have cooled a bit, spread the icing thoroughly over the tops (I like to give the corner ones extra attention, because they tend to get the most crusty).

 - Enjoy immediately. If you have left overs, cover tightly and enjoy more the next day. And the next day. And the next day--these will stay moist that long!

Tender, warm, sweet--perfect with coffee, and it will keep you full until dinner time. Trust me.

      And there you have it, folks, a new way to enjoy pumpkin on Thanksgiving. Or any other holiday. Or just about any day, really, I mean breakfast really should happen on a daily basis.



*Ta-daaa! I made up another word for you!