A few years ago, my husband had an American colleague who kindly passed along this recipe from his childhood. We had bonded on our respective Thanksgiving festivities and traditions, and more importantly over the food served up over this time. My favourites are still pumpkin pie and pumpkin cheesecake – although I am open to new pumpkin experiences like pumpkin spice lattes (which unfortunately I found out contain dairy and I have thus been denied this drink forevermore!) and pumpkin muffins. In fact, the longer I live here (in the UK) the more I seem to obsess about my limited access to anything with pumpkin.

Which brings me back to these biscuits… These are not biscuits in the traditional sense. They are much softer and very similar to the cake part of a whoopee pie – assuming you have tried these. Their mix of spices is certainly autumnal and I would suggest trying them out at least once. Perhaps even sandwiched with a chocolate butter-cream centre?!?

Makes 3 dozen (little biscuits or 18 medium)

• 2 1/2 cups Castor Sugar
• 1/2 cup Butter or non-dairy Spread (I use Pure Sunflower)
• 2 Eggs
• 1 cup Canned Pumpkin Puree (roughly half a tin)
• 3 cups Plain Flour
• 1 tsp Baking Powder
• 1 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
• 1 tsp Salt
• 1 tsp Cinnamon
• 1 tsp Nutmeg
• 1 tsp Vanilla
• 1/2 cup (1/2 pkg) dark chocolate chips

Oven 180C / Fan 160C / 350F

Cream together the sugar and butter/spread in a bowl. Beat in the other wet ingredients in bowl; eggs, pumpkin and vanilla. Mix together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and spices. Add the flour mixture to the wet mix and beat until smooth. Stir through the chocolate chips.

Drop heaped tablespoons of batter onto prepared baking sheets and bake for 10-12 minutes. Allow to cool for 5 minutes on the tray before transferring to a cooling rack.

Did you know?

Thanksgiving in Canada occurs in the month of October, not November like their southern neighbours, and it is a celebration of the harvest from that year, along with other blessings.