Pecan Pumpkin Butter Dip

About a month ago, my tennis team had an end-of-season get-together. Everyone brought a variety of appetizers and sweets. It was here that I first tasted Louise's contribution: Pecan Pumpkin Butter Dip. It's a wonderful salty/sweet combination. I knew then it would be a perfect new appetizer to share at Mom and Dad's Christmas Eve celebration.

It's especially a winner when you realize just how easy it is to make. Simply layer a few ingredients and you're done! Louise used to work at Williams-Sonoma, and it turns out that this is one of their store favorite recipes. Evidently, their pumpkin butter is quite popular and sells out each season. How am I just now learning about what is now a new favorite of mine? If you go to their website, you'll find even more recipes that you can make with this versatile ingredient.

If you're looking for a quick, yet tasty appetizer, look no further. This is great with crackers, apple slices, crudites, etc. I'll be serving mine tomorrow with Wheat Thins . . . the limited edition holiday kind for an added festive touch!

Pecan Pumpkin Butter Dip

Ingredients:

• 8 oz cream cheese, softened at room temperature
• 4 oz Muirhead Pecan Pumpkin Butter
• 3 strips of bacon, cooked and diced
• 1 cup chopped pecans

Directions:
Layer the above ingredients in the order given. That's it! 

Team "Over Served" - November 2014

Adapted from: Williams Sonoma

First Annual Westhaven Cookie Exchange

Yesterday, I participated in Westhaven's First Annual Cookie Exchange. What a wonderful way to meet more neighbors! I especially enjoyed hearing stories behind each recipe, ranging from "this is a five-generation cookie . . . I've never had a Christmas without it" to "I found this on Pinterest last night!"

In the past when I've hosted cookie swaps, it has been on a much smaller scale. One would bring a dozen cookies for each person in attendance. Each dozen brought was beautifully packaged in some way. . . lots of work, I'll tell ya. With over 20 in attendance yesterday, the process had to change because no one wants to make or eat 20 dozen cookies. (OK, no one wants to make 20 dozen cookies.) So instead, everyone brought 6 dozen cookies displayed on an open platter. Some brought a few extra for tasting, and this was completely optional. Each person brought his/her own empty container and then gathered 3-4 of each kind. I was able to leave with 20 different varieties, yet I only made one. Deal!

I brought the same red velvet cookies that I took to last year's swap. The beautiful festive color along with the simple, simple list of ingredients make them a perfect holiday cookie.

Red Velvet Cookies

Here are the other wonderful varieties (in no particular order). Hopefully, I didn't miss any!

Ribbon Cookies

Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies

Rosemary Honey Cookies

Fudge Puddles

Chocolate Candy Cane Crunch Cookies

Snowball Cookies

Chocolate Snickerdoodles

Chocolate Chip Tea Cakes

Lemon Crinkle Cookies

Linzer Sandwich Cookies

Candy Cane Kiss Cookies

Truffles

Spritz Cookies

Rudolph Bites

Peanut Butter Blossoms

Food for the Gods Filipino Cookies

Sun Butter Buckeye Balls

Maraschino Cherry Squares (or Rounds)

I'm hoping that the beautiful platter above will last until Christmas Eve when we celebrate with our extended family in Knoxville. In the mean time, I will be following Holiday Tip #239:

The perfect napkin for our cookie exchange! :)

Thanks to Sadira Ebert for initiating this event and to the other committee members for helping organize it. Huge success!

Harness Thanksgiving 2014

Instead of heading to Mom and Dad's this year, we celebrated Thanksgiving at Scott and Tina's house. As usual, we had plenty to eat. I brought my expected three loaves of homemade sour dough bread as well as two chocolate pies and a turkey veggie tray. I've enjoyed watching Keely make her version for the last two years, so I wanted to join in on the fun. This year, I giggled the whole time as I made this cute fella.

Scott prepared a fried turkey, but he also shared a smoked turkey with us that one of his neighbors gave him. As if we needed even more meat, Mom contributed a honey baked ham. It was all delicious!

Mom (aka Grandma Harness) prepares her ham.

There were so many sides: hominy, roasted sweet potatoes, candied yams, pumpkin muffins, cranberry congealed salad, deviled eggs, pumpkin dip, broccoli, green beans, dressing, and Tina's cheese baked grits (my personal favorite!) . . . just to name a few.

Desserts spilled over to another table:  Rice Krispie treats, fudge pie, pecan pie, German chocolate cake, tapioca pudding, and chocolate meringue pie. Mmmmmmm.

Typically, food takes center stage at our Thanksgivings. Not this year. Not surprisingly, babies stole the show!

I'm so grateful that most of our extended families are able to get together as much as we do. In fact, we were even blessed to have our cousin Janie join us from Texas! A huge thanks to Scott and Tina for hosting this year!

Vicke (aka Nana) gives Rylan his first taste of "KK bread."

Steve (aka Baby Hog, er Grandpa) wouldn't share Kaydence. Grandpa Harness and Janie have to look from afar!

All four siblings (KK, Vicke, Scott, and Jackie) welcome another generation (Lawson) to the Harness clan!

KK and Keely:  Thanksgiving 2014

Cinnamon Rolls 101

After sharing some of my homemade cinnamon rolls with my tennis buddies, some of them asked, "Will you teach me?" Why, of course! In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I decided to hold my first baking class. We had a blast!

I began preparing a couple of weeks in advance to make sure there were enough starters (a concoction of potato flakes, sugar, and warm water) for everyone. Then, I fed each of the starters Tuesday night. The first session began on Wednesday morning when we each made a batch of dough. Let the rising begin!

Let the rising begin!

The main session took place that same evening. First, I had to get everything ready. At each of the five stations, you could find waxed paper, bread flour, butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, etc. I knew this would be the "calm before the storm."

The "calm before the storm."

Ready, set, go! First, literally punch down the dough. It's crazy how something so simple can be so silly and satisfying!

Punching down the dough!

 I took them through the major steps of rolling out the dough, spreading on butter, layering the brown sugar and cinnamon, rolling up the dough, cutting the "log" into the cinnamon rolls, and laying them out in the pan. I also showed how to use the dough to make a basic loaf of bread.

Lots of concentration here from Karen, Kristy, Margaret Ann, and Nancy.

Kristy can't be serious for long! :)

By the end of the session, most every surface was covered with cinnamon rolls!

This is one proud Margaret Ann. (And she should be!)

Nancy proudly displays her finished product as well!

The last session took place this morning and in my absence. After rising all night long, the only thing left to do was to put them in the oven and then top with icing. It thrilled me to hear that there were a lot of happy campers this morning.

The Montgomery brothers (Mims, Cole, and Penn) happily served as taste testers.

Out of the mouth of babes: Admittedly, Cole said that "Puckett's is better." Ya gotta love such brutal honesty. For a moment, I was reminded of the movie scene in Michael:

 Battle!

I'm not ready to concede just yet. So, you can bet that I'll be heading to Puckett's of Leiper's Fork to do some competitive benchmarking analysis! I'm betting that I may discover new factors that I can experiment with. Hmmmmmm. Maybe I can count this as work. Take one for the team, right? :D

In the mean time, I'm already thinking about things that I'm grateful for during this season. With experiences like this, my list has grown.

A Westhaven Halloween

When we first moved into our new subdivision last August, I was both excited and nervous about Halloween. "Plan for literally 1000 trick-or-treaters." Oh dear! Unfortunately (or fortunately???), the weather delayed Halloween a couple of days. . . just long enough that we were not able to participate due to out of town commitments. Thankfully, we had procrastinated and had not purchased our candy yet. Dodged that bullet!

So, tonight is our first official Westhaven Halloween. This holiday is a pretty big deal around here. Our annual Witchaven that took place last Saturday draws people from all over the area. Residents go all out with their decorations. The pressure! Furthermore, I can no longer simply plop my over-sized Shrek in the yard as he finally died after this last move. I miss him already! This year, Keely and I decided to put our new painting skills (ahem) to good use.

I painted the pumpkin and sign, whereas Keely painted the witch. After hanging them up, the bottom two paintings were missing the following morning. What? I suspected they simply fell down, yet I could not find them anywhere! Surely someone wouldn't have stolen them. Seriously? I kept looking, but to no avail. I realized I was more angry at the thought that some would-be thief didn't think my pumpkin was worthy enough than the thought that someone would actually steal them. Ha! Not surprisingly, there was no thief at all. They had indeed fallen down, but Keely had already taken them inside. My pride was restored.

I must admit that my minimal decorations do not compete with many of my neighbors. Here are just a few of my favorites:

I feel like I have the best of both worlds. I can enjoy these awesome decorations on my daily walks, yet I take great pleasure knowing that I don't have to store any of this stuff!

Happy Halloween!