Pilgrim Pies

Recipe Source Family Fun and my friend, Lauren.

Ingredients:

PUMPKIN COOKIES
2 eggs
2 cups light brown sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin
3 cups flour
1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt

FILLING/CREAM CHEESE FROSTING
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup butter, softened
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 to 5 cups confectioners' sugar

Instructions
1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Beat the eggs, brown sugar, oil, and vanilla extract in a mixing bowl until smooth. Stir in the pumpkin. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, pumpkin spice, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the egg mixture a half cup at a time, blending each time until smooth.

2. Drop a heaping tablespoon of batter onto an ungreased cookie sheet, using a moist finger or the back of a spoon to slightly flatten each mound. Bake the cookies for 12 minutes, then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.

3. Meanwhile, make the frosting. Beat together the cream cheese, butter, and vanilla extract in a bowl until light and fluffy. Mix in the confectioners' sugar a half cup at a time, until the frosting is spreadable.

4. To assemble the pies, turn half of the cookies bottom side up and spread a generous amount of cream cheese frosting on each one. Top them with the remaining cookies (turned right side up).

Makes 10 to 14 Pilgrim Pies.

Libby's Strawberry Salad & Poppy Seed Dressing

Oh man. This salad is amazing. I already have a different strawberry salad recipe on the blog (which is also good), but here is the difference:
I'm pretty sure I just heard angels singing. This dressing is super duper good. It could be used for a variety of salads, not just strawberry salad. Trust me. This dressing recipe is a keeper. :) I give my husband's cousin Callie (The On Call Cook) full credit here. Go check out her blog for the most amazing recipes. Seriously. Her blog is way better than mine :)

www.oncallcook.blogspot.com (I can't figure out how to make this a link because I'm cool like that so........just copy and paste).

Libby's Strawberry Salad
Source: Libby Coombs, a sweet old lady Callie knew from church

1 head of Romaine lettuce, torn into pieces (I used spinach)
1/2 red onion, diced (I didn't have red onion on hand when I made it)
1 1/2 c sliced strawberries (use more if you'd like)
1/2 c slivered honey roasted almonds

dressing:
3/4 c mayonnaise
1/3 c sugar
2 T milk
1 T cider vinegar
Optional: (I added 1/2 TBS Poppy Seeds, but you could add less or leave them out completely as Libby did.)

Combine all the salad ingredients in a bowl.

Whisk all the dressing ingredients together in a bowl. I let mine sit in the fridge for about 15 minutes in the hopes that the sugar would dissolve to avoid the graininess, and it wasn't grainy at all. Score!

Pour about 1/4 c dressing on the salad at a time and toss to combine. Add more dressing until you've reached a dressingy-ness that you like.

Serve immediately.