Pumpkin Bars

These super-moist Pumpkin Bars are the bomb! 

Presenting to you persimmon bars substituted with pumpkin baked with dates and nuts with a little lemon juice and lots of spice. These bars are a perfect treat for the fall days you’ve been longing for. Cooler weather at last!

Persimmons?

While digging into one of those old cookbooks at my Momma’s again (I don’t recall the name of it, but I snapped this picture), I found a recipe for yummy Persimmon bars that I thought you’d like. Notice the date when Mrs. Mier published her recipe. It’s been around, to say the least.

Oh, you don’t know what a persimmon is?

Well, it’s a fruit that resembles a tomato. It comes from a tree which grows easily in the mild climate back home in southern Louisiana. I have a vivid memory as a child of biting into a persimmon before it was fully ripened. I ended up with puckered lips before getting correct instructions on how and when to eat it. After getting past the skin, the flesh is the pleasant part. Here’s a link for more information about them, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persimmon.

Persimmon recipes are sometimes hard to come by so this one made with dates piqued my interest. Since this fruit isn’t common up here in the ArkLaMiss, I decided to use pumpkin in its stead.

More Tasty Ingredients

The lemon juice in these pumpkin bars flavors well giving the pumpkin a bright lift of taste just like in this persimmon recipe. Also, notice above that raisins or dates may be used, but we’re choosing dates because they are so popular these days. The benefits are their natural sweetness that helps to reduce the amount of white sugar, and their fiber gives good texture. Altogether these ingredients along with spices of ground cinnamon, nutmeg, and clove make this a perfect fall treat with healthful benefits.

You’ll find these bars are delicious without the glaze, so make it any way you like.

Here’s the updated version of the recipe card with nutrition facts below for your printing convenience.

Pumpkin Bars

Moist, nutty, chewy pumpkin bars made with dates and pecans are delicious with or without their lemony glaze.

• Author: Louisiana Woman
• Prep Time: 10 minutes
• Cook Time: 20 minutes
• Total Time: 30 minutes
• Yield: 30 bars 1x
• Category: Sweets
• Method: Baking
• Cuisine: American

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

1 cup canned or cooked fresh pumpkin

1 1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 egg

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup vegetable oil

8 ounces dates, chopped small

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon ground cloves

1 cup pecans, chopped

Glaze (optional)

1 cup powdered sugar

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix pumpkin, lemon juice, and baking soda together in a small bowl and set aside. Combine flour, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves into a medium bowl. Blend egg, sugar, and oil together in a large bowl then stir in dates. Add the flour mixture into the egg mixture alternately with the pumpkin mixture until all is well blended. Stir in nuts and pour batter into a 10 x 15-inch pan that has been greased and floured. Bake for 20 minutes or when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let pan cool completely before cutting into bars or glaze then cut into bars.

Lemon Glaze

Mix powdered sugar with lemon juice and keep stirring until smooth, the glaze will be thin. Drizzle onto the cooled pan before cutting into bars.

Notes

Persimmon pulp may be substituted for the pumpkin.

The pumpkin bars are delicious with or without the glaze.

Keywords: pumpkin bars

If you are blessed to live in a place that has access to persimmons, use the persimmon pulp instead of pumpkin and please let me know how they turn out. Thanks, and happy baking!

Love isn’t a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like “struggle.” To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now.

Mr. Rogers