Apple Spice Whoopie Pies

One of the problems with posting a new recipe every week is that there isn't always time to perfect a recipe. If this recipe were going into a book, I would tweak and test until it was exactly the way I wanted it. But I now have over two dozen whoopie pies in the freezer, and you can bet that I have no intention of making more anytime soon! So I'll just speculate about what I might do differently.


Has anyone else noticed pumpkin whoopie pies everywhere? They're on the covers of catalogs and in all kinds of cooking newsletters. I've been drooling over them but wanted to try one of my favorite combinations instead of pumpkin. Seems like most of the recipes have cream cheese fillings, which I suspect is much more appropriate for most adult palates. The whoopie pies I ate as a child always had a marshmallow or egg white filling, though -- marvelously creamy and sweet, so I went with the marshmallow creme filling.



These taste terrific, but I would make a few fine-tuning changes. Perhaps 1/4 cup more flour. Maybe a little more baking powder, and cut back on the dark brown sugar by 1/2 to 1/3 cup.



One of the pumpkin recipes suggested four tablespoons of batter for each cookie, so I half filled a 1/4 cup measuring cup for the first tray of cookies. Although they looked small, they spread to 3-4 inches in the oven. Now that's the size of whoopie pie I remember, but honestly, they're very big.
















So I went to a level tablespoon, which produced 2 inch cookies. Much better but also fairly big. I found I got the best results by using an icing bag with a generous tip. The result was mini-cookies which are 2-3 bites and what most of my friends would prefer (they of the "just a bite for me, please" gang).














Otherwise, the process was pretty straight-forward. The marshmallow filling is a beautiful consistency. I read that one should only make it with shortening and never with butter, but I found that unsalted butter worked great. It can be spread or piped on, whichever you prefer.

Apple Spice Whoopie Pies

1 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon cloves

1 stick butter (room temperature)
1 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup regular sugar

2 eggs
1 cup unsweetened applesauce


Preheat oven to 350. Cover baking sheets with parchment paper.

Mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices in a bowl and set aside. Cream the butter with the sugars. Add each egg and beat well. Alternate adding applesauce and flour mixture, mixing until nicely combined.

Depending on the size of whoopie pie you want (see above), drop batter onto parchment paper, leaving room for them to expand. Bake at 350 for 10 minutes. Cool 4-5 minutes before removing from parchment paper. Be sure to lift them off the paper while still warm.

When cool, spread one with filling and top with a second cookie.


Marshmallow Creme Filling

1 stick unsalted butter (room temperature)
1 jar marshmallow fluff
2 cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

Beat the butter with the marshmallow fluff. Beat in vanilla, and gradually beat in the powdered sugar.

Coming December 3rd.