The weather has changed and it is Cold! It is the end of October and the frost still is not on the Pumpkin. This cold gives me the desire to cook up something. Since our garden is still full of small pie pumpkins and all our Farmers Markets are done; I can’t resist looking through recipes that use pumpkin. I found a good one, Pumpkin Pie drink. This drink tastes just like a pumpkin pie only it is a liquid. First of course I ran out to the pumpkin patch to get a pumpkin. I picked out two small ones, since I’m heating up the oven I might as well cook a couple of them to save energy and harvest a little more pumpkin puree. The dogs had to come along and I had a terrible time trying to take a photo without them in it. They were so happy to have me outside with them that they were full of frisk and frolic.
We brought our two pumpkins back into the house cleaned and cut them in half from stem to base. I removed the seeds and stringy pulp and saved the seeds in a bowl to bake the pumpkin seeds. I covered each half with foil and baked foil side up in a 325 degree oven for an hour to an hour and a half until the pulp was soft when tested with a fork.
After the pumpkins began to cook I cleaned the seeds by running water over them in a colander sitting in a bowl of water, until they were free of the pumpkin pulp. Then I spread the seeds on a cookie sheet and salted lightly. I cooked them for about 10 minutes on each side, stirring them in between times. They did not get very brown but they tasted good when cracked. Sugar pumpkins have a small seed; usually I like to use the seeds out of the AmberCup winter squash. They are much larger.
When the pumpkins came out of the oven I removed the foil and let them sit awhile to cool. Then scraped as much of the pumpkin into the blender as I could without getting any of the skin or overcooked areas into the pulp. The small 4 inch pumpkins made 1 cup of puree while the bigger 6 inch pumpkin made almost 2 cups. This is nice to know for making a pie that uses 2 cups of puree. I blended the pulp until smooth pushing it down with the spatula to help the process. I did turn off your blender when I scraped the sides to push it down I would of been blending the spatula along with the puree.
Now for the Pumpkin Pie Drink…Here is the recipe. Blend together the following: 1/2 cup Pumpkin Puree, 1/2 cup milk, 2 tablespoons Sugar, 3/4 teaspoons Pumpkin Pie Spice, 1/2 teaspoon Vanilla. After it is blended pour it into your favorite cup. I liked it cold but Ken liked it hot with some whip cream on top. Wow, it was goooooooood either way. A great way to savor the Fall season. Hope you are enjoying the fall and its gorgeous colors.
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