Welcome to Tag Sale Tastes’ Pumpkinpalooza!  Despite the fact that it’s still technically summer for another three weeks (but really, go ahead and put those white shoes up), the stores are already full of a veritable pumpkin patch of pumpkin spice products and autumn décor.  I’ll be checking out some of these products, for better or worse, along with some recipes and other pumpkinalia.

Like Tina Turner in Proud Mary, I’m going to take the beginning of Pumpkinpalooza and do it easy.  And so, to kick off Pumpkinpalooza, I’ll begin with Pepperidge Farm’s limited edition Pumpkin Spice Swirl bread:

This is one of ten different swirl breads that Pepperidge Farm offers.  Who knew?

Checking the ingredients, you’ll notice that pumpkin is one of the ingredients, although it’s so far down on the list that I have to wonder if it’s just there for show:  The pale slices are thick-sliced, with a faint spice (?) swirl and dotted with little cinnamon-flavored blobs:

If you try this bread straight out of the package, you’ll probably find yourself checking more than once to see if, in fact, you are nibbling on the package and not the bread.  But — if you lightly toast the bread and butter it, it morphs into something that is actually quite good.

In fact, my kids love this bread.  I don’t necessarily know that I could tell the difference between this and Pepperidge Farm’s Cinnamon Swirl bread if I were eating it blindfolded — seems like one spice swirl is pretty much the same as the next.  But if you want to ease into pumpkin spice season gently, a little pumpkin spice swirl toast in the morning is a pleasant way to do so.

Rating:  4 pumpkins (out of 5)