Pumpkin Party!

Clint and I have a Halloween party each year, it's our annual thing. This was our second year doing it- so yes, we're still trying to establish it as a "thing". It'll come.

Last year it was Halloween party. This year it was a pumpkin party. This is because I'm crazy and love Iron Chef (original or America, but I like the dishes on America better).

Many of the dishes I made for our pumpkin party were delicious. Some were not so great. I am going to tell you about all of them.

Appetizers and sides
Pumpkin hummus
Pumpkin cream cheese dip
Pumpkin olive tapenade
Pumpkin challah
Cheese (colby jack and jalapeno jack, cut into pumpkin shapes)
Pumpkin garlic knots (by far the favorite of the night)
Salad with pumpkin vinaigrette and pumpkin croutons

Entrees
Pumpkin, leek and spinach quiche
Pumpkin, apple, ricotta pizza on pumpkin pizza dough
Pumpkin turkey chili
Pumpkin cornbread
Pumpkin gnocchi with cinnamon walnut cream sauce

Desserts/sweets
Caramel fondue with pumpkin and apple
Pumpkin apple walnut muffins
Pumpkin raisin healthy cookies

Drinks
pumpkin beer: Smuttynose, Dogfish Head and (one more I've forgotten)
pumpkin spice lattes (I was the only one who didn't love these)
wine (all non-pumpkin wine)
elderberry schnapps (not pumpkin, but we got it out anyway)
Pumpkin martinis, which we actually forgot to serve, so had the following night (our guests weren't missing much).

Over the next few days, I'll link to all these recipes. Even though some of the dishes were not successful, I more or less know why, and how to fix that. The one exception was the pumpkin gnocchi, which did have a delicious cream sauce, but was really bland. Next time I will try a different recipe. But with the exception of the gnocchi and the martinis, I recommended making any or all of these dishes.