Now that the Fall season is well underway, with the weather changing and the leaves turning all of these wonderful shades of colors, many of us just want to curl up underneath something warm and drink something hot. But before you head out to your suburban coffee shop and order that “Pumpkin” spice latte, how about making one for yourself for a fraction of the cost and with real ingredients?

The Fall season is well known for vibrant colored produce, like all of the variety of squash. However, its best known for pumpkins. Yes, those lovely orange colored, often times enormously sized, products that most Americans take home, carve up into some cute facial expression, place a candle inside of, and leave to rot on their front porches as Halloween comes and goes. But what if we actually ate them?

This year pumpkins seem to be in plentiful supply here in the Northeast US; that means they are cheap. We bought a single pumpkin for $5.00 two weeks ago. We have been having real pumpkin spice lattes, pumpkin soup, mashed pumpkin and sweet potato, and fried pumpkin for two weeks and we still have 1/3 of it left! All of that for $5.00?! Yes. So get out there and buy a pumpkin. Then eat it, drink it, and enjoy it!

It took a long lazy Sunday afternoon and about 4 attempts before Debra perfected the recipe for this, so please enjoy!

Ingredients:

1 ½ cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk

1 can full fat coconut milk

2 cups mashed pumpkin

½ cup maple syrup

2 tsp pumpkin pie spice

Directions:

Add all ingredients in blender and blend until smooth

Add 1 cup of pumpkin spice latte mixture to your favorite coffee mug and heat in microwave until hot and frothy. If you are adverse to using a microwave, just heat the 1cup of mixture on the stove top.

Add your favorite hot coffee or espresso to taste and stir. I personally recommend 2 shots of espresso.

Makes 8 servings. Refrigerate for storage.

Do you have a favorite Fall season drink? Let me know below!