Pumpkin Shortbread... almost...

I am not sure if you have noticed, but I have been doing a little bit of work on the blog recently. Nothing too major, but I am trying to make it a bit better, a bit easier to navigate...

In addition to these changes, I started a Facebook page for the blog to help share the fun. If you are on Facebook, stop by and "like" my page - you can find it here.

I was so excited when the first "like" came in that I offered that first fan a treat as a thank you. I mean, what could be better? Become a fan of a cooking blog, get a yummy treat in the mail! Easy, right? Umm... yeah. Didn't quite work out that way.

We have had crazy craziness around here recently, and I actually haven't done as much baking, especially not extra baking recently. But then I stumbled across a recipe that looked so seasonal, so delicious, and like the perfect thing to share with a friend and fan. Pumpkin shortbread. I was set.

Everything started out great. The idea of these bars is basically that of a pumpkin pie with a shortbread crust, just baked in a square, rather than in a classic pie pan.

The shortbread crust, using both brown and white sugar (YUM!) came together quickly and easily.

And I carefully (and with washed hands) pressed it into my foil lined pan.


I then prepared the pumpkin layer, which was carefully poured on top of the (unbaked) shortbread layer.


And then the whole thing goes into the oven. The recipe called for it to bake for about 50 minutes, or until the top is golden brown. Well, after 50 minutes, the timer beeped, but the top was nowhere near golden brown. And the pumpkin layer wasn't really set. I checked it again after 5 more minutes. Then 5 more... then 5 more... I think you know where this is headed. I finally figured it was as cooked it was going to get, and pulled the pan out of the oven. After letting it cool in the pan for a little while, I used the foil to pull it out, and here's what it looked like:


Not quite like I'd imagined, but not too bad... I figured that once I cut off the edges then cut it into squares, it'd be closer to what I'd pictured.

Silly me.

All that extra baking time killed my shortbread. While keeping the pumpkin layer soft. I can't even tell you how much time and patience it took to cut off the edges.

I tried. Really hard. I even then tried to cut it into squares. But the bottom was too tough and the top refused to hold its shape. So it was definitely not send worthy. We wound up eating the topping by scooping it off of the shortbread, as it was just too tough to cut real pieces or bite through them even when we tried.

Needless to say, I was pretty disappointed.

But I thought I'd share anyway, since the concept and intention were good, and, well, it just goes to show that they can't all be winners!

April, if you are reading this, I promise I'll send something... at some point... just not these... :)

(recipe to follow... due to the technical difficulties we had earlier in the week, I lost all my bookmarks, and I can't seem to track this one down again, but I still wanted to share the story... I will update the post with the link and recipe as soon as possible...)

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