Vittles Divine

This recipe is for all of you pumpkin pie lovers out there. This. is. better. For realsies. I got this from my friend Susie and it's the bomb diggity. I think it's something like 8000 calories per bite, but it's worth it .  Not exactly cake... not exactly pie.... just think of it as pumpkin perfection on a plate and go with it. Crust : 1 box yellow cake mix (reserve 1 cup for topping) 1/2 cup melted butter 1 egg Filling : 20 oz pureed pumpkin (not 29 ounces!) 12 oz can of evaporated milk 1 and 1/2 cup sugar 4 eggs 1 tsp salt 2 tsp cinnamon 1 tsp vanilla 1 tsp ginger 1/4 tsp ground cloves Topping : 1 cup cake mix (that has been reserved) 1/4 cup sugar 1 tsp cinnamon 1/8 cup butter Directions: Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray 9 x 13 pan (I used just a metal cake pan). Mix together CRUST ingredients and spread into the bottom of pan. Mix FILLING ingredients together very well and pour over crust. Mix TOPPING ingredients together until crum

I fancy myself to be a decent cook, but I am a longstanding baking failure.  These two skills don't necessarily go hand in hand and I have moaned about it quite a bit lately. Recently I received a very timely, rather lengthy, and somewhat threatening email from my good friend Emily. She's a very accomplished baker, not that you can tell from the size of her skinny jeans, but whatever. My recent complaints troubled her deeply enough that she felt it was time to stage a no-nonsense intervention before my children lost all hope for homebaked goods and my husband started sniffing at the neighbors' kitchen doors. She admonished me to unleash the Baker Within. She pointed me toward an amazing recipe that is designed specifically for high-altitude baking and sent me a private discourse on the do's and dont's for novice bakers. The result: a paragon of cookie perfection. I am a baker . I bake. I made 54 absolutely perfect chocolate chip cookies.  Not doughy.