Frosted Pumpkin Cranberry Bars

Article by Kai Barr

Recipe from Taste of Home (link after the article)

Alright, kings, queens, and monarchs, if you’re like me, then you love fall. You like pumpkins and crunchy leaves and the fact we have the ability to wear clothes we’d never wear otherwise—in example, the dinosaur onesie I wore last Halloween—around. One of my favourite things about fall (or autumn) is some of the food. Now, today we’re going to learn how to make Frosted Pumpkin Cranberry Bars! Why? Because I want to make these and I don’t know any better way to have the recipe memorised and written down somewhere than by typing the whole thing out in its own article!

This recipe takes a total of thirty-five minutes. Of those, fifteen minutes will be used to prepare, and twenty minutes will be used to bake. This recipe is also to make about four dozen, so if you’re going to be making less or more of that then be sure to look up the proper proportions for the ingredients. I’ve never had these myself, but I’ll make them and probably add a review sometime when we actually get pumpkin stuff in my house.

So! For the ingredients, you will need the following:

The Rest of It:

1-1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

1-1 1/4 cups of sugar

2 teaspoons of baking powder

2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon of baking soda

1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger

3 large eggs that are room temperature

1 can (also marked as 15 ounces) of pumpkin

3/4 cup of melted butter

3/4 cup of chopped and dried cranberries

Brown Butter Frosting:

1/2 cup of butter (not melted this time)

4 cups of confectioners’ sugar

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract (I know it smells like Jesus’ tears, but please don’t try drinking it, vanilla extract is disgusting)

4 to 6 tablespoons of whole milk (you could go with 5 if you wanted to)

Optionally, additional dried cranberries

Okay! So, when you have those ingredients, you will need a large bowl. In said bowl, your job is to combine the first six ingredients in the list of “The Other Stuff” (1-1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour, 1-1 1/4 cups of sugar, 2 teaspoons of baking powder, 2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon, 1 teaspoon of baking soda, and 1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger) into that bowl. Stir those ingredients until they’re all good and combined and everything. You don’t want to have chunky batter. Meanwhile, in another bowl, you’re going to whisk the eggs, the pumpkin, and then the melted butter together.

Once you’ve done that, you’re going to spread all the batter into a baking pan that is a) greased, and b) 15x10x1-inch. You’re going to preheat your oven to 350 degrees Farhenheit, and then you’ll put the pan in for about 20-25 minutes. If you’re not sure whether or not it’s cooked all the way, take a toothpick and then stick it into the center. Just stick it in and pull it out, see if it comes out clean. If it does, then stick it on a wire rack to cool!

Finally, for that brown butter frosting, you are going to want a large and heavy saucepan. For 5-7 minutes, you’re going to cook that unmelted butter over some medium heat. You could also just wait until it’s a nice golden-brown color if you’re too lazy to put a timer on. So pour the butter into a large bowl (not the one you’ve already cooked in, that’s not healthy) and then beat in the vanilla, confectioners’ sugar, and enough milk that the consistency is good enough to be spread. After that, you’re going to frost the bars. Now, you might be wondering, “Kai, what about those optional cranberries you mentioned? What do I do with them?” Well, if you don’t want to have extra cranberries, then you don’t do anything. But if you do, then you just sprinkle those extra cranberries on. Just make sure they’re chopped and dried, it’s better that way. Or experiment, I won’t judge.

Nutrition Facts

For each bar:

130 calories

5g fat (3g are saturated fat)

26mg cholesterol

96mg sodium

21g carbohydrate (16g of sugars, 1g of fiber)

1g protein

And that is it! Thank you for reading, you’re all loved and appreciated and awesome and amazing! I hope you like the bars, hope they come out perfectly, and I hope you have a nice week! See you in the next article.

Find the Actual Recipe from Taste of Home Here