Garlic Cheese Beer Bread Mini Muffins

Using this standard Beer Bread Recipe and few minor changes I made mini muffins for a weekend party. They were a BIG hit and super simple.This is how I did it.

• 3 Cups all-purpose flour
• 1 Tablespoon granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 Tablespoon baking powder (fresh!)
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese. 
• 12 ounces draft beer
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) salted butter (melted)
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic salt

Heat oven to 375ºF.
Combine flour, sugar, salt, baking powder, garlic powder and cheese in a large mixing bowl.
Slowly stir in beer and mix just until combined. Batter will be thick.
Drop by teaspoons into 2 sprayed mini muffin pans (24 muffins each)
Melt butter. Mix in garlic salt. Pour 1 teaspoon butter over each muffin.
Bake about 20 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick  stuck in the center comes out clean.
Pop out of pan into serving basket. Makes 48

Dilly Vegetable Dip

• 8oz Cream Cheese - Softened
• 1/2 cup Mayonnaise
• 2 teaspoons Dry Onion Flakes
• 1/2 teaspoons Beau Monde seasoning**
• 1 teaspoons Dill Weed
• 1 teaspoons Dry Parsley Flakes

Mix all ingredients until smooth. Serve at room temperature with cut veggies of your choice.

**Beau Monde seasoning can be hard to find. Personally I like the dimension it adds but you can leave it out all together and it still tastes good. If you can't find it and want to make your own, here's a recipe that works just fine!

Beau Monde Seasoning:

1 tablespoon ground cloves
1 1/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon ground bay leaf
1 tablespoon ground allspice
2 tablespoons ground pepper
1 tablespoon ground white pepper
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground mace
1 teaspoon celery seed

In a small mixing bowl, mix together all ingredients. Pour into a tightly closed jar and store in a cool, dry place. Yields approximately 9 tablespoons.

Pumpkin Puree - From Scratch

Roasting:
Gather and wash sugar pumpkins (the kind for baking, not jack-o-lantern making) These are usually smaller in size and darker in color.

• Preheat oven to 425º F 
  
• Slice off stem, then cut in half.  
• Remove the stringy innards and seeds. (Set aside to roast pumpkin seeds later)
• Lightly coat jelly roll pan (cookie sheet with edges) with spray, coconut oil. (I use a small amount of coconut oil on a paper towel to do this) or parchment paper. **
• Turn pumpkins upside down (flesh down / skin up) on the pan.  
• Place in center of oven to Roast. 
• Pumpkins are done when a knife can be inserted through the thickest part easily. Check after 1 hour. If they are not yet done check in 10 minute increments for another half hour.

Preparing Puree:

• Remove from oven and allow to cool enough to be worked with. 
• At this point the skin will peel off easily.  Remove skin and put soft flesh into a large bowl.
•  Puree with food processor or immersion blender until smooth.  

Use puree immediately or choose to prepare it for storage. I highly recommend an immersion blender for this type of process but if you don't have one a food processor works just as well. You simply have to plan on doing the pureeing in batches rather than everything all at once.

Storage:

• I choose to freeze mine so I place my freezer bag into a cup, folding edges over the side.  
• With a one cup dry measure I place 2 cups of pumpkin puree in each bag.  
• Ziploc all but one corner of the top of the bag. 
• Lay it flat on the table. 
• Press puree evenly in the bag until all air is removed and bag lays flat with puree filling entire bag. 
• Ziploc the corner and place flat into freezer. 

Thaw pumpkin in sieve to drain off excess water from freezing before use.

**Notice I do not add water to the roasting process. This is because most small sugar pumpkins (the best kind for puree) have plenty of water in them already. I find I get a really good consistency using the dry method roasting process and it saves me the step of having to drain the puree'd pumpkin through cheese cloth before storing.

Roasted Savory Butternut Squash

1 large butternut squash peeled, seeded and chopped into 1 inch pieces
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 cloves garlic minced
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper

Mix all the ingredients together in a large bowl until squash is well coated with olive oil and seasonings.  Dump into a shallow sprayed casserole dish. Bake at 400ºF for 60 minutes. Toss once during baking.