Pumpkin Time!

Sunday, October 28, 2012

'Turned that medium pumpkin from the CSA into pumpkin puree and some pepitas (roasted pumpkin seeds.

Making roasted pumpkin seeds is easy enough, once you have the raw seeds (although you can catch some process photos at The Pioneer Woman):

1. Remove most of the pumpkin guts from the seeds.
2. Rinse seeds in water and spread on a cookie sheet.
3. Let seeds dry for several hours!
4. Sprinkle a few teaspoons of olive oil and some generous quantities of table salt over the seeds.
5. Coat seeds in salt and oil by tossing with your fingers.
6. Roast in a 250 degree oven for ~1 hour, or until light brown.
Remove from oven, let cool, and eat whole.

The pumpkin puree's pretty simple too (although, it takes some effort), but if you want photos, Pioneer Woman has a nice tutorial:

1. Cut off top of pumpkin, cut body in half from top to bottom.
2. Scrape out seeds and guts from pumpkin sides
3. Cut halves into quarters (you have 4 pieces)
4. Put pumpkin quarters onto a cookie sheet and roast at 350 degrees for 45 minutes (or until you can stab it with a fork)
5. Remove from oven, let cool a bit, and scrape the pumpkin skin from the flesh.
6. Shred pumpkin flesh in a food processor until the large lumps are gone.
7. Freeze leftovers in a plastic bag.