Pumpkin Cornbread: aka trendy-but-humble-pumpkin-spice-loaf

My work has a Facebook page for social media promotion of the library.  On the page we have an occasional Test Kitchen series, where we make a recipe from the collection and then share it.  In October the Test Kitchen theme was Autumn spices...which basically means that we finally jumped on the Pumpkin-Spice bandwagon.  (There are pumpkin-spice lattes, pumpkin-spice granola...Why not a pumpkin-spice library?)     

Since I'm one of the department's more avid bakers, I volunteered for this month and make Pumpkin Cornbread.  The original recipe came from page 29 of Cinnamon: The Watkins Kitchen Collection, copyright 1995.

The recipe here is the original and in the final product the spices are fairly subtle.  The consensus from tasters was that you can smell them more than taste them. If you want this to be a true "pumpkin-spiced" cornbread, you may want to add more of some/all of the spices. But be careful, a little can go a long way!

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup yellow cornmeal
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp. nutmeg
• 1/8 tsp. ginger
• 1/8 tsp. ground cloves
• 1/8 tsp. salt
• 1 cup canned pumpkin (not pie filling)
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup milk

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 
2. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and beat until well blended.  (Suggestion: use a whisk to stir together all the dry ingredients and all the spices, then add the wet ingredients and whisk/stir/beat until well blended.)
   
3. Pour into 9 inch loaf pan
4. Bake for 45 minutes
   
5. Cool in pan for 10 minutes and then turn out
   
6. Cool completely before slicing.  (It will slice really nicely if you wait!)
   
7. Serving Suggestion: Drizzle with honey, preferably a good local one!