Look at these fun little guys! They are the perfect, 4-bite taste of Fall - these would be great for a cocktail party around Halloween or Thanksgiving!
What you'll need:
8 ounces cream cheese (at room temp)
1 cup pumpkin puree (not the pie filling!)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
3 eggs (2 in filling, 1 for crust)
1 tsp vanilla extract
box of pie crust (2 crusts in each box)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Add all the filling ingredients in a bowl (note - only add 2 eggs - the third egg is for the pie crust which you will see later).
Bring everything together with an electric mixer.
On a floured surface, roll out one of the ready made pie crusts. It needs to be a little thinner than if you were to just roll it out. We need to try for 12 circles...
Looking at the size of the mini cupcake pan, I found something that would give me a large enough circle to fit in each cupcake - clearly I didn't roll my crust out enough because I only got 10! Never you fear - all the scraps that remain can be brought together and then roll that out so you can cut two more circles.
Place each crust round in every other cupcake spot - Then with more of the scraps leftover, use a little to fashion a tiny stem for every pumpkin. Once all 12 are in the pan, brush the crust with egg white (from the 3rd egg). This will give the edges a nice, golden-brown crust.
Fill each cup with the pumpkin cream cheese mixture just about to the top of the crust. Bake for about 15 minutes and then check them - mine ended up taking a few more minutes to make sure the crust was fully cooked - If they don't look nice and golden, give them 3-4 more minutes.
Yummy! Look how great! I let them cool for about 5-10 minutes and then use a butter knife or frosting tool to insert down the side, then pop them out. Repeat the whole process with the second pie crust...
(Makes 24)
(Makes 24)
Now for some decorating...
This was maybe 1/3 cup semi sweet chocolate chips - warm in microwave for 20 seconds, stir then another 20 second until melted. Add a tiny dash of vegetable oil if chocolate seems too thick.
Spoon the melted chocolate into a Ziploc sandwich bag - concentrated in one corner. Snip a tiny amount of the plastic corner so that when the chocolate is squeezed out, it will be a very thin line.
Very easy to make little jack-o-lantern faces! If you don't want to make these for Halloween - since it is clearly not Halloween anymore... just leave off the faces!
If anyone watched the Sandra Lee Halloween special on the Food Network, I really should have put "EAT ME" on a few of these... hahaha Enjoy!!!
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