It's time to choose sides

About a week ago I got this text from Ken.

It's good to have friends who really get you. Who know that the arrival of pumpkin flavored goods is cause for joy and celebration. Because, as Patrick said, the arrival of fall is the harbinger of so many great things and number one of those things is pumpkin flavored food.

It's odd that Pumpkin is so seasonal. Because nearly everything pumpkin flavored is made with canned pumpkin, which is available anytime and tastes the same whether you eat in in May or October. It's not like Peach Pie, or something, which is really only good with fresh peaches and therefore can only be enjoyed the three weeks of the year that peaches are fresh. But, by golly, it IS seasonal. Pumpkin earlier than September 1st and later than November 28th just seems weird and out of place. Ken has a moratorium in his home against using Pumpkin as a pet name, because it is seasonal. (Why would you call someone "Pumpkin" in June?)

During the Weeks of Pumpkin, if I am in a restaurant, bakery, soap shop, candle maker or fragrance distributor and there is a pumpkin option, you can guarantee that is what I will buy. Perhaps it is the seasonality of it that makes me crave it so. You can get the Red Velvet Cheesecake at the Cheesecake Factory at any time. But you can only get the Pumpkin Pecan Cheesecake a few weeks out of the year so if you happen to be at the Cheesecake factory at that time and the Pumpkin Pecan Cheesecake is available, then why would you order anything else? Do you hate Freedom?

But, strangely, I know there are people out there who don't like Pumpkin. They don't want to eat a pumpkin bagel with pumpkin cream cheese, light a pumpkin scented candle and get into a shower and wash with pumpkin scented body wash. Like Republicans, I don't really understand these people, but as a Christian, I will try and love them even though they smell like Tropical Breeze and they are eating a blueberry bagel and the leaves are turning orange, for the love of the Great Pumpkin!

So give me your pumpkin Soup with toasted pumpkin seeds. Your pumpkin ice cream. Your pumpkin bread slathered in pumpkin butter with a side of pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. I'll build myself a house out of pumpkin cake, pumpkin pie and pumpkin cheesecake and adorn it with pumpkin pancakes , pumpkin biscuits and pumpkin ravioli. Pumpkin donuts, pumpkin snicker doodles and pumpkin whoopie pies shall be hung above the entry and the air will be scented with Glade Plugin Pumpkin Spice and Yankee Candle Company's Pumpkin Wreath. And I shall bathe in Sweet Cinnamon Pumpkin from Bath and Body Works and drink great mugs of pumpkin cream hot chocolate. And I shall then eat my pumpkin house and sleep on the streets, a satiated and pumpkinful homeless man.

But seriously, only until November 28th. Then we move on to peppermint.

I Want To Smash My Face Into This

Image and recipe originally from kraft.com

Once it becomes Autumn, don't you want to only eat pumpkin flavored things? And then build a house out of pumpkin flavored things and then eat your house? I love pumpkin and this is one of my favorite pumpkin desserts. We originally discovered it in one of those Kraft Magazines they send you to get you to buy more craft products. It's quick, easy and amazingly delicious. I admit, it looks kinda lame, and when you read the recipe, it seems even lamer but trust me it is delicious. When you eat it it seems much more decadent and complex. 

What you Need:

• 1 package yellow cake mix
• 1 can (15 oz.) pumpkin
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 4 large eggs
• 1 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
• 8 oz. cream cheese
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tub cool whip
• 1/4 cup caramel topping
• 1/2 cup pecans, chopped

How you do it:

Preheat oven to 350°. Grease and flour 2 9-inch round cake pans. Mix the cake mix with 1 cup of the pumpkin, milk, oil, eggs and 1 tsp of the pumpkin pie spice. Pour into pans. Bake for 20-22 minutes until it passes the toothpick test. 
Cool for 10 minutes and then remove from pans. Allow to cool completely.
Beat cream cheese in a small bowl with electric mixer. Add powdered sugar, remaining pumpkin and remaining pumpkin pie spice. Stir in cool whip.
Cut cakes horizontally. Stack on a serving plat spreading the cream cheese mixture between the layers. Don't frost the top layer. Drizzle with the caramel topping and pecans. Keep in refrigerator until ready to serve.