sweet lovely "yumo" pumpkin bread

This is a family favorite!  Caleb has declared this to be "yumo", especially the cookies.

But not only am I going to give you the recipe I use, but if you painted your pumpkins like I did mine you can cut them up and use that instead of buying the can stuff.  Most canned Pumpkin is 16 oz which equals 2 cups.

This is how you do that... cut pumpkin half, take out seed and stringy stuff, place on cookie sheet. Cook in oven at 350 for at least an hr.  (The bigger the pumpkin the longer. I had one big one that each half I cooked for 1hr 45 min.) Drain as much as the clear liquid as possible.
Place in blender or mixer until it is pureed.  A quick mixer tip.  "Place a lint free towel over your mixer and bowl to help cut down on having to clean up splatter." 

From here you can use or freeze.

side tip.  I often have batter left over and I make drop cookies from the batter.  cook for about 8-10 min at 350. 

Pumpkin Bread (from Betty Crocker's)
Pre-heat oven to 350.
1 can (16 ounces or two cups) (I use a touch more than this. probably 2 1/2 cups)
1 2/3 cups sugar
2/3 vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla (my vanilla is stronger than most... add 3-4 teaspoons to equal my 2)
4 large eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour (or whole wheat flour) (mine uses all-purpose)
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt (or less)
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (or more)
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoons baking powder
optional: 1/2 cup nuts and/ or raisins.  (Mine has neither.)

I will give you their directions and mine.  Since I cook 4-6 batches I do mine so I'm out of the kitchen a bit quicker.  My bowls are not big enough to hold two batches.  This will yield around 3-4 large loaf pans.

Instructions:
1.  Move oven rack to low position so that tops of pans will be in center of oven. (very important! I take out one of my racks and place it over the sink for a "dryer rack")  Heat oven to 350.  Grease bottoms of loaf pans with shortening. (I use spray canola oil.)
2.  Mix pumpkin, sugar, oil, vanilla, and eggs in large bowl.  Stir in remaining ingredients.  Pour into pans.  (Here I differ quite a bit. I do all the dry ingredients in as many bowls as I'm doing batches.  Then as I'm mixing I add in liquid ingredients that I whip as needed.  That way raw eggs are sitting out a much less time.  You will have to mix on a higher speed for longer.  And I'm not in the kitchen that long.  It does mean more dishes, but that is what dishwashers are for.)
3.  Bake 8-inch loaves 50-60 min, 9 inch loaf 1hr10min- 1hr20min, until toothpick comes out clean. Coll 10 min in pans on wire rack.  Loosen sides of loaves from pans; removes from pans and place top side up on wire rack.  Cool completely before slicing.  Wrap tightly and store at room temperature up to 4 days, or refrigerate up to 10 days. (This is easily frozen.  Thaw in the fridge)

Baking time for mini loaves:
Amount of batter:               approximate time bake time at 350.
1/4 cup                                             15-20 min
1/3 cup                                             15-20 min
1/2 cup                                             25-35 min
3/4 cup                                             35-40 min

Food Storage

Many of you know I am a huge couponer.  In order to take advantage of the best price, I often have to "stock up".  Many people say they don't have room for this.  And as far a fresh, refrigerated, and freezer foods.  This maybe true.  I did get a half chest freezer because my little side by side did not have enough room to store much at all.  I like to freeze a lot of things. Some things that may surprise you that freeze well is cheese and liquid non dairy creamer.  Some kids yogurts freeze well, but most yogurts do not.

I found this great brochure at Publix a while back and just refound it while I was going through stuff.  I hoped that I could find it online to share with you but it looks like no one has it.  It is called   "The Food Keeper, A Consumer Guide To Food Quality And Safe Handling"  It is developed by Food Marketing Institute.   It has so much great information in one place.  If you go to Publix ask for it!  But on their website it does have a place where you can search by food product.
http://www.fmi.org/consumer/foodkeeper/
In a yellow area you can put in your food product and out pops how long and where it should be stored.
Looks like this:
To search for a specific food, enter a search word here:

Search:

 Once you have done your search it may
Like this:

Food	Refrigerator	Pantry	Freezer	Special
Dips, sour cream based	2 weeks		Do not freeze
Sour cream	7 to 21 days		Doesn't freeze well	Cover tightly. To prevent bacteria from spreading to leftover cream, don't return unused cream to original container. Keep covered.

But here are some other helpful links
Cornell University links and USDA links seem to be the most helpful.
Cornell University:
http://counties.cce.cornell.edu/chemung/nutrition/#safety

http://blogs.cce.cornell.edu/herkimer/files/2009/04/Web-Sites-for-the-Home-Preserver-20091.pdf
USDA:
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/fact_sheets/Focus_On_Freezing/index.asp#8
Food Safety.gov
http://www.foodsafety.gov/keep/preparing/index.html
Fight Bac!
http://www.fightbac.org/
UGA
http://www.uga.edu/nchfp/how/freeze.html
FDA
http://www.fda.gov/ForConsumers/ConsumerUpdates/ucm093704.htm#basics