Happy Birthday Dad!

We gathered tonight to celebrate Dad's birthday with much laughter over splitting the bill (literally).


Even Dad's nemesis stopped by today to wish him a Happy Birthday! That looks like a smile on his face, Dad.

And I want to share another great recipe that I copied from Katy's Food for a Hungry Soul blog: Pumpkin Cranberry muffins.

Actually, Katy's recipe (which she found on Coleen's Recipes blog) is for bread but muffins work best for breakfast and coffee breaks in the ancestral home. I reduced the sugar slightly because we're all 'sweet enough' already. ;-)

Pumpkin - Cranberry Bread
Yield: 2 loafs or 32 muffins

Ingredients:
3 cups all-purpose flour
3 1/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
3 cups granulated sugar (I reduced to 2 cups)
(1) 15 ounce can pure pumpkin
4 eggs, slightly beaten
1 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup orange juice
2 cups fresh or frozen cranberries (I used dried)

Directions:
Grease and flour two 9" x 5" loaf pans and set aside. Preheat oven to 350 F.

In a large bowl, measure flour, spices, baking soda and salt. Whisk together until well blended.

In a second bowl, mix sugar, pumpkin, eggs, oil and juice until well incorporated.

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix with spoon until just moistened. Gently stir in cranberries.

Pour batter into prepared loaf pans and bake 60 - 65 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. For muffins, bake 25 minutes.

Cool in the pan for about ten minutes then release from the pans and turn them out. Wrap the hot bread immediately in plastic wrap, covering tightly, allowing the bread to cool completely in the wrap. This is the secret to making this bread super moist!