Spiced Pecan Pumpkin Pumpkins

How much do you like short-cuts? A lot? Me too! Well, these little pumpkins are practically made of short-cuts.

Last weekend the Mr. took me shopping at the famous King of Prussia Mall (yes, the biggest mall on the East Coast just happens to be 10 miles from my house). He needed to exchange a shirt at J.Crew and I 'needed' to stop by Williams-Sonoma. I flipping love that place. 

He gave me the "get anything you want" speech and left me to my vices. Yeahhhhh, he obviously has no idea how much trouble I could get into in there. I'm too good of a wife to take advantage of that go ahead so I stuck to a minimum. 

All I grabbed was:

• Sesame Street Pancake Molds as a Christmas present for our nephew
• Pumpkin Carving Kits for each of us because the ones from the grocery store ALWAYS seem to break halfway through the first pumpkin (we cannot be the only people that this happens to... right?)
• Mulling Spices because we could easily inhale the hot spiced cider that they have on tap
• Spiced Pecan Pumpkin Bread Mix because, well, the name says it all. I mean, who wouldn't buy it?

photo courtesy of williams-sonoma

Now I normally don't buy mixes but Williams-Sonoma's are the one and only exception. While they might be a tad pricey, they are worth every penny. This stuff would put Betty too shame. Not only are they delicious, but they bake up in a jiffy. 

Yes, you could definitely do this from scratch but with this bagged mix, the only ingredients you need are a stick of butter, an egg, and some water. I opted to cut the butter in half and add an extra can of pumpkin puree just to up the ante. Even with that little addition, it was still easy peasy. 

Rather than making loaves or even muffins, I decided on little bundt cakes using my super awesome mini bundt pan (on clearance for $7.97!). The best part was that these took only 15 minutes to bake.

I drowned the first batch in homemade caramel sauce.

The second batch was made into little pumpkins. Simply put two bundt cakes together and form a stem and vine out of green tootsie rolls. Can't get much easier than that! (You could also use chocolate tootsies or soft caramels.)

Have you tried other Williams-Sonoma mixes? Or do you have a different brand that you prefer? Do you leave them as is, or jazz them up?

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