The Beginner’s Guide to Fall Baking

Does the crisp, cool air inspire you to bake some delicious fall treats? Fall is the perfect time to bake because seasonal produce is abundant and cooler temperatures make it easy to turn on the oven. As you prepare your favorite recipes, it’s important to remember that baking is more of a science than cooking. Unlike cooking, ingredients need to be measured precisely for the best results. If you love to bake, but need some inspiration, we’ll help you make perfect pies and delicious cookies. Follow these tips to get great results for your autumn inspired baked goodies.

Choose seasonal fruit.

We know, summer gets all the glory when it comes to fruit, but fall produce is amazing. Plus, you need to do something with all of those apples that you picked! Other great choices for fall baking are cranberries, pumpkins, pears, and pomegranates.

Gather the ingredients and tools needed.

Gather all of the ingredients and tools that you will need ahead of time so you are not stopping and searching for necessary items in the middle of baking. It’s distracting and can lead to skipping an ingredient or missing a crucial step.

Use complimentary spices.

Cinnamon and pumpkin pie spices are popular for a reason, but there are other tasty spices that work equally well in autumn baking. Nutmeg, ginger, cloves, allspice, mace, star anise, cardamom, coriander, fennel, five-spice and peppercorns all create a different taste experience.

Add in purees for extra nutrition.

Purees from seasonal vegetables such as pumpkin, sweet potato or squash will make any baked good moist. You can safely add 2 – 4 tablespoons of a puree without having to do a substitution with other ingredients. Want to replace some of the fat? Swap out half of the oil or butter for a puree or unsweetened applesauce.

Choose easy to follow recipes.

If you’re a novice baker, you should choose simple recipes that do not have a long list of ingredients or call for multiple bowls. You are more likely to produce delicious baked goods when the instructions are easy to follow.

Skip the piecrust.

Does the thought of making piecrust intimidate you? Make a crisp or a crumble instead. You get all of that juicy goodness and no crust required! Or, use an alternative to flour based crust, such as nuts, or make a low-fat graham cracker crust.

Combine ingredients according to the recipe.

It might be tempting to cut corners and dump all ingredients into the mixing bowl at once. For optimal results, always follow the recipe step by step.

Properly measure out ingredients.

When baking, quality depends on having precise measurements. It’s easy to use too much or too little flour with a measuring cup. We recommend using our Precision Pro Digital Kitchen Scale to get the most accurate measurements and the best results. Using the scale’s tare feature will zero out the weight of the bowl, allowing you to measure each subsequent ingredient by weight. If you weigh everything in a mixing bowl on the scale, you won’t need a measuring cup, which means less dirty dishes. Visit Shane’s Killer Cupcakes blog for a video review on how to measure flour with an EatSmart Kitchen Scale. With a little planning and experimentation, you can have yummy baked goods that are full of fall flavors.

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To help get you started in the kitchen, we’ve chosen some seasonal, easy to follow recipes. Healthy Pumpkin Muffins by Fueling a Fit Fam Apple Crisp by Healthy Recipes Apple Pie Oatmeal Cookies by Amy’s Healthy Baking Whole Wheat Pumpkin Applesauce Bread by Food on the Table Pumpkin Breakfast Cookies by Leelalicious Cranberry Apple Oatmeal Muffins by Celeb Baby Laundry

Do you have a favorite easy to bake fall recipe that you want to share? Tweet us at @eatsmartscales.