Iron Chef of America!!

For YW (church group) on Wednesday night we had an Iron Chef of America Contest. We had such a good time. The secret ingredient was hamburger meat and pumpkin. They were supposed to just choose either sweet or savory, but half wanted sweet and half wanted savory...go figure. Anyway, it turned out fun and we had lots of yummy food to eat! Here are the results:
Amber, Alica and Cherisha with their sweets.

Amber decided to outside the box and do neither pumpkin or hamburger, so she opted for brownies with sliced bananas and drizzled chocolate for the top. They were DELISH!

Alisha and Cherisha made the Pumpkin Cookies with Cream Cheese Frosting...they were sooo good! Thanks for the recipe Emily!

Pumpkin Cookies

1 c. shortning (no substitutes)
2 c. packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
3 1/2 c. flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon (I always add a bit more...)
1 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 c. canned pumpkin

Cream shortening and sugar till light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time beating well after each. Beat in vanilla. Combine flour, powder, soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg together. Alternate adding powder and pumpkin until combined.

Grease the cookie sheet and with a small scoop, scoop cookie dough onto baking sheet. Pat the top of dough down a bit with a spatula. Bake at 400 degrees for 10-11 minutes. Cool.

Frosting:
1 c. powdered sugar
3 oz. cream cheese
4 TBS butter
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Frost cookies when cooled. Enjoy!

This is Carly and Katie...they made the savory. They did a fantastic job on spegatti and meatballs with some cheesy garlic bread! I ate dinner before they all came, but this was so good, I had a second dinner.
Up close and personal...
So, these were a few of my Laurels (young women ages 16-18). They are a great group, always have fun ideas and always keep me on my toes....