Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Whoopie Pies

It’s practically a law that Thanksgiving desserts involve pumpkin. I believe that they should also involve chocolate, and that the combination of pumpkin and chocolate isn’t given nearly enough respect. In my family, my grandma, aka Honey, cooks most of the Thanksgiving feast. Several of the ladies in my family provide desserts. I had planned to make a chocolate pumpkin pie. Then I found a recipe for pumpkin chocolate chip cookies at A Tasteful Garden. These are the most wonderfully moist, cakelike cookies you will ever taste. Because they weren’t decadent enough on their own, I decided to sandwich two cookies together and add cream cheese frosting to the center.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Whoopie Pies
Makes approx. 2 dozen mini pies

Cookie Ingredients
2 cups. fresh roasted pumpkin
1/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 egg
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. milk
1 tbsp. vanilla extract
1.5 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Frosting Ingredients
8 oz. cream cheese, softened
1 stick butter, softened
1 cup powdered sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
a dash of cinnamon & nutmeg

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350ºF.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine pumpkin, sugars, egg and oil.
3. In another bowl, mix flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Dissolve baking soda in milk and add to the mixture. Add this mixture to the pumpkin and combine well. Add vanilla and chocolate chips.
4. Drop onto a greased cookie sheet by half teaspoons and bake until lightly browned, about 9 minutes.
5. While cookies are cooling, combine frosting ingredients using a stand mixer.
6. Make whoopie pies by spreading frosting on the flat side of half of the cookies. Top with another cookie and press together lightly.

My thoughts:
1. This cookie dough spreads a lot. Be sure to leave ample space between cookies on the cookie sheet. The first time I made these, they were too big. I backed off on the size the second time I made them, and christened them mini whoopie pies.
2. Normally, cream cheese frosting calls for 2 cups of powdered sugar. The cookies are so rich that it would be overwhelming if the frosting was that sweet.

Recipe Source: A Tasteful Garden