Pumpkin Pie Spice

Spices and seasoning are an a crucial part of cooking and baking. Without them, food can be bland and unremarkable. But the addition of just the right combination can have a profound effect on your dishes and make the just okay into spectacular!

Who doesn’t love pumpkin pie, right? The key to a pumpkin pie vs a pumpkin pie that will be seared in the memories of all who eat it is the ingredients. For the sake of time and the title 🙂 we will focus on the spices.

Sure you can use store bought jarred spices. You will get a pumpkin pie that tastes okay, but why just okay when you can make it remarkable? An experience that will leave the tasters dreaming about your pie for years to come. To begin with you need great spices. Here in the US they are allowed to irradiate and do other nasty things to the spices sold commercially. To avoid this please check with the manufacture to see if they indeed irradiate theirs. I love Simply Organic because they have high quality standards, and have exceptional quality spices.

When choosing spices, you can go with a high quality spice from the store or a whole spice and grind it yourself. The difference is taste. No different than using fresh sage or rosemary vs dried. You loose a little taste. ( I kinda do a combination of both, as ginger is really hard to have whole and dried 😉 My preference is to use whole and grind mine with a coffee grinder or a spice grater, but sometimes I am use jarred. Regardless of which of the two applications you use, you will want to toast them. Yes, toast them. Trust me, do a taste comparison. Make two pies, one with un-toasted spices and one with. Your jaw will drop. I’m seriously all about good tasting food! To toast your spices before use , place them on a tray in a toaster oven or in a stainless steal pan. Low and slow is the key. You will need to watch closely. It doesn’t take much time, but is truly worth the effort. About 2 to 4 minutes is all. I use a stainless steal skillet on Med. Stirring the spices the whole time. When you start to smell the spices strongly your done. Remove from heat and remove spices from pan. If the spices got to dark or burnt, DON’T use them, start over.

Ingredients for Pumpkin Pie spice

4 tsp Cinnamon
2 tsp Ginger
1 tsp Nutmeg
1/2 tsp clove
1/2 tsp all spice (most other pumpkin pie spice recipe omits this spice, but I adore the depth of flavor it gives my pie) This recipe is for 2 pies and leaves a little extra for other dishes.

Now your spices are ready for pie or whatever other dish you are making with pumpkin pie spice.

I hope you enjoy this recipe, and please let me know what you think and if you used it, how it turned out.

Cheers, Kristy