Recipes with pumpkin??

Lesley_Gaye

I have quite a few pumpkins to use from the garden so have been looking at all the lovely pumpkin recipes on here and will be trying some of them. I have a delicious Nigel Slater recipe for a savoury pumpkin tart somewhere. I'll post it if anyone is interested

Made a lovely Pumpkin and Apple Chutney last week. The recipe is from a Tesco magazine, can't remember which one as it was a couple of pages I had torn out. The recipe is called Butternut Squash Chutney, but I used a small pumpkin from the garden. It came out with a lovely flavour, quite a sweet chutney and not as vinegary as most

875g pumpkin, peeled and cut into 2.5cm cubes
2 large cooking apples, peeled and roughly chopped
4 carrots, diced
2 large onions, peeled and chopped
200g raisins
5cm fresh ginger, chopped very fine
1 tsp dried chilli
0.5 tsp mixed spice or ras el hanout (used mixed spice as I had that)
700ml cider vinegar
2 oranges, peeled, segmented and chopped
500g granulated sugar

place all ingredients except oranges and sugar in a preserving pan and bring to the boil. Simmer gently for 30 minutes until mixture is soft
add oranges and sugar. Stir until sugar is dissolved and simmer gently for 45 minutes until the mixture is thick and pulpy.
spoon mixture into hot sterlised jars and seal (protect metal lids with cling film or the vinegar will rust the metal)
store for at least a week befor eating, keeps 6-12 months

I tried mine as soon as it went cold and it was delicious!

funky_snow

Can folks share their tips on hollowing their halloween pumpkins.
In the past we have cut the top out - then used hands to get out the stringy bits with the seeds and then spooned out the rest - which ends up as slivers rather than useful chunks. (that I'm ashamed to say in the past I have just thrown away!)

This year I am going to be OS and less wasteful and tempted by a curried soup as my first pumpkin recipe as hopefully that will add some depth to the taste which won't be amazing as we are picking pumpkins for their carving potential!

So any tips on how to hollow so you get usable chunks for a soup?
thanks

Penelope_Penguin

candyblue wrote: »

A quick question for you all, can you freeze pumpkin? If so what is the best way?

I would also appreciate any recipes as I have two 50 pound pumpkins to scoop out and make into lanterns and dont want to waste the filling

Thanks

You can freeze pumpkin flesh, either raw or cooked

As Miskool says, 50lb pumpkins will have been grown with a lot of water, and IMHO won;t be fit to eat - treat yourself to a butternut squash or other interesting edible pumpkin, which when roasted will be a treat in a risotto or lasagne

As this has fallen from the front page of OS, I'll add it to the existing pumpkin thread, to give you more recipe ideas.

Penny. x

Stephen_Leak

Firstly, any sized chunk is usable for a soup.

Pumpkin has a quite delicate flavour, which can always take a little lift, but is also all to easy to overpower.

Here's my nice and simple recipe ...

PUMPKIN SOUP

This is a great way of using up what you’ve scooped out of a pumpkin lantern and/or making use of the cheap leftover pumpkins. At other times of the year, this recipe should work with butternut squash instead of pumpkin.

Serves 2

INGREDIENTS

500g of pumpkin
1 clove of garlic
½ an onion
1½ tablespoons of oil
½ a tablespoon of lemon juice
½ a teaspoon of mixed herbs
1 vegetable stock cube
500ml of water
125ml of milk
Ground pepper to taste

METHOD

Cut the pumpkin into quarters, remove the peel and seeds, and cut it into 2cm (1 inch) pieces. Peel the garlic and cut it into quarters. Peel the onion, cut it in half, chop one half into 2cm (1 inch) pieces and save the other half.

Put the oil into a saucepan on a medium heat. Fry the garlic and onions for about 2 minutes until the onion is soft but not coloured. Stir frequently to stop it sticking.

Add the pumpkin and continue to cook for another 3 minutes. Stir frequently to stop it sticking.

Add the herbs, lemon juice, stock cube and water. Bring to the boil, then turn down the heat until it is just boiling (simmering). Put the lid on the saucepan and continue to cook for another 20 minutes until the pumpkin is soft.

If you have used a bouquet garni, remove it now! If you have a food processor, put the soup in it and blend it to the desired consistency. If you have a hand blender, put it in the soup and blend it to the desired consistency. If you don’t have a food processor or hand blender, use a potato masher, press the soup through a sieve with the back of a spoon, or leave it lumpy.

If you used a food processor, rinse out the saucepan and put the soup back in.

Reheat the soup again gently but do not allow it to boil.

Season with the pepper.

ADDITIONS & ALTERNATIVES

Vampires should, of course, omit the garlic.

Use butter instead of the oil.

Use a bouquet garni instead of the mixed herbs. It looks like a big tea bag with herbs in it, and stops them being left in the dish. Don’t forget to fish it out before blending.

Add ¼ of a teaspoon of ground ginger, at the same time as the herbs and lemon juice.

Garnish with either a swirl of crème fraîche, fromage frais, natural yoghurt or single cream, or a sprinkle of chopped chives or parsley.

Kiwisaver_2

Don't panic if you have heaps of pumpkin, it keeps for ages in the fridge if it has been cut, if not they will last almost forever uncut and stored in a cool place. The flesh is a lot like carrot and will just start to soften a bit as it gets older, it doesn't go off as such and will be perfectly usable for ages in soup or as veggie addition to mince dishes, grated as a thickener for other soups or stews. I usually keep one in the fridge and hack lumps off as and when I need it, sometimes the exposed side will get a bit soft and might need a bit trimmed off to reveal the crisper flesh below.

zippychick

i'm really disheartened now. I have the contents of two supermarket pumpkins coming my way. I've never tasted it before and was dead excited about cooking with it, but it sounds like they have n ext to no flavour. Where's the depressed smiley

zippychick

just thought I would bump this.....

CCP

You might be lucky and get nice ones, Zippy, so don't get depressed just yet. If they are a bit tasteless try roasting them before use - I find that helps the flavour of most veggies.

zippychick

CCP wrote: »

You might be lucky and get nice ones, Zippy, so don't get depressed just yet. If they are a bit tasteless try roasting them before use - I find that helps the flavour of most veggies.

yeah, am gonna roast and see how it tastes, but how will i know if it tastes right, if i've never tasted it?

Gonna try a mish mash of pumpkin and carrot soup and then freeze some to use in muffins etc (even though i don't know how i would use it in muffins )

CCP

Have you eaten other types of squash - butternut or similar? Pumpkin is much the same, but generally not quite as sweet-tasting.

If it does prove to be a bit tasteless then using it in cakes / muffins is probably a good plan - it won't matter if it doesn't taste of much as it will be mixed in with other, tastier things (in much the same way that I don't care much for carrots but will eat as much carrot cake as you care to give me! ).