The weekend before Thanksgiving I had quite an undertaking in my kitchen. My daughter has an upcoming study abroad trip for two weeks in Antigua and she was concerned about having extra money for the trip that occurs right before Christmas. So I suggested she have a little fundraiser to help her, and together we decided to sell pumpkin rolls and zucchini bread for $10/roll/loaf. A great idea as both are pretty easy to make and I love to bake. I figured we’d sell 15 or 20 and it could bolster her account a bit before her trip….well, it was a huge success and we sold 18 zucchini breads and 32 pumpkin rolls lol! 😆
I started two weeks before getting two big pumpkins, and a dozen small zucchini. I roasted the pumpkins, pureed them and put them in the freezer. And then we grated all the zucchini, bagged them up, and popped those in the freezer too!
Making your own puree when you have a bunch of these to do is way more cost effective and super easy to do! Wait until just after Halloween and your local pumpkin farm likely has them marked down for the season! I bought two big pumpkins for $8 (USD), a savings of about $32 from buying the same amount of canned puree. Two large pumpkins provided 26 cups of puree! Enough for all 32 rolls and 1 big pumpkin pie! I highly recommend doing this. If you’re not making pumpkin rolls or pies add it to sauces, soups, and stews! And don’t forget to roast the seeds!
I started zucchini bread on Thursday as these take longer in the oven. I did 4 after work on Thursday, 8 on Friday, and the remaining batches on Saturday.
For the pumpkin rolls I used my food prep containers to pre-prepare my dry ingredients, and then made them one at a time like an assembly line. It worked perfectly!
I also made big batches of pumpkin roll filling ahead and had it ready for use in the refrigerator as the rolls were cooled and ready for finishing. This also saved a huge amount of time.
Everything went perfectly until…Sunday morning. I was preparing the last batch of roll filling needed, and tragedy struck. I have a kitchenaid mixer, and on the front of it there is a small metal cover where attachments can go onto the machine. It is held on with a small screw that I frequently have to tighten. Well, I was so busy making sure I was on track to finish this huge order and I forgot to check it. While whipping my cream cheese in a large glass bowl, the cover fell off, hit the paddle and broke my beautiful bowl in two, sending sugar and cream cheese flying everywhere! I wanted to cry!
Not only did it break my favorite mermaid scale kitchaid mixing bowl, but it also chipped my paddle.
I was devastated. I finished the last of the pumpkin rolls, in my metal mixing bowl (thankfully I had it). Once finished and delivered. I decided to message my friends at Kitchenaid. Not knowing the best way to reach them I did what any good blogger would do and I started with Twitter lol. I sent a private message with pictures from the incident. And all I can say is Kitchenaid is now my ALL TIME favorite brand! They were so nice, asked a few basic questions, and today they notified me that my items are being replaced under warrantee!! They sent me the order confirmation, I should have my replacement bowl and paddle soon! It’s a Christmas miracle gang! I still can’t believe it!
All I can say is if you have a tragedy in your kitchen and one of your favorites gets damaged, reach out! These companies appreciate their customers and want to help! I’m certainly glad I did!
Thank you Kitchenaid!! And Happy holidays!
Barnwood and Baked Goods 