With the welcoming of Autumn today, we enter into pumpkin picking season along with the variety of pumpkins available at North Fork farm stands. Pumpkins of every color and size are on display from the Blue Hubbard to bright orange sugar pumpkins to the green and white strips Delicata, the fields are replete with every hue. Find your way on to a pumpkin patch or a corn maze, and settle in on a hayride on a Sunday morning drive.
Pick up a few pumpkins for the Fall holidays and use one of them for these Maple Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Energy Bars. This recipe is a resourceful way to use pumpkin when you are finished carving with the family or baking the seeds for a Fall snack. The natural energy in these bars will be a great pick-me-up for any day.
Here you can find all of the best farms and farm stands with their hours and phone numbers – remember to call ahead as hours change seasonally on the North Fork.
Maple Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Energy Bars
Makes 30 bars
Ingredients:
1 15oz. can great northern beans (or Navy or Cannelini beans), drained and rinsed
1/2 cup pureed roasted pumpkin meat (de-seeded, de-veined/oven roasted and peeled)
1/2 cup New York State maple syrup
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups oats
1 cup gluten free flour or whole wheat flour if gluten is ok
1/2 cup pepitas (toasted pumpkin seeds)
1/2 all bran cereal
1/4 currants or dried cranberries
1/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
In a food processor, combine the beans, pumpkin, syrup, pumpkin pie spice and salt and blend until very smooth. Add the flour and pulse to combine. Add the oats and pulse to combine.
Transfer to a large bowl. Add the All Bran and chocolate chips, raisins and stir to combine. If the mixture seems spreadable, you’re good. If it’s too dry, add 1/4 cup of water. If it’s too runny, add an additional 1/4 cup of flour.
Grease a 9×13 pan. Spread the mixture in the pan and pat down with your hands or a spatula.
Bake for 15-18 minutes. Let cool and then cut into 1-2 inch squares. Remove from the pan, wrap the squares individually in plastic wrap and keep in the refrigerator.
