Another year, another un-traditional pumpkin pie...

I alluded to a dessert we had in yesterday's post after we enjoyed our Thanksgiving feast - I had asked Jeff what he might want and he suggested anything with pumpkin, but something a little different. Here's a look at a couple past Thanksgiving desserts we made - the first was a Cinnamon Streusel-Topped Pumpkin Pie we made couple years ago.

Last year we did the Pumpkin Pie Cake.


While this years dessert was not nearly as much work as the other two, we both thought this easy Frozen Pumpkin Mousse Pie ranked quite high on the pumpkin dessert list.

The original recipe has you prepare this treat in a pie plate, but I wanted to make serving go a little easier and assembled it in a springform pan. The crust was so good and only had 3 ingredients - crunchy gingersnaps, canola oil and a surprise ingredient - raisins! The raisins add just a little sweetness and since they are buzzed with the spicy gingersnaps, their stickiness helps hold the crust together.

The filling is a smooth combination of mashed pumpkin sweetened with moist brown sugar and spiced up with cinnamon, ginger, fresh grated nutmeg and a pinch of cardamom. This mixture is then stirred together with silky softened vanilla bean ice cream until the color changes from that milky white to a darker creamsicle. We put the ice cream pie into the refrigerator for about 15 minutes before we sliced it - it was just soft enough to cut through without a problem, yet had not begun to melt or make a mess. We've tried a couple pumpkin-flavored ice creams before that you would find in the freezer section, but adding our own mashed pumpkin and spices to good-quality vanilla bean ice cream made a tremendous difference!

To break up the ritual leftover buffet, I thought I could make some Chile-Rubbed Steak Tacos to have for dinner tonight. We rubbed a big ol' piece of flank steak with a spice mixture consisting of chili powder, garlic powder, salt, crushed red pepper, black pepper and an intriguing addition of cinnamon. We used The Griddler to cook the steak, but fire up the grill if you are so inclined. Once the steak had rested, we sliced it into thin strips (always against the grain!) and piled the pieces on warmed white corn tortillas.

With the spice rub, the tender steak has a robust flavor that can stand up to a variety of additions on top. We added shredded crisp romaine and sharp white cheddar cheese - use whatever toppings your heart desires as this recipe is just a base. While you don't really taste a pungent cinnamon flavor, it added a subtle sweetness that heightened the steak's flavor. Not one to waste any chance to add flavor, we drizzled the assembled tacos with a little bit of the juice that was left after slicing up the steak.

Recipes
Frozen Pumpkin Mousse Pie
Chile-Rubbed Steak Tacos