Roasting a Pumpkin Whole

Pumpkin

Last year, I planted a couple of acorn squash plants, and one of them turned out to be pumpkins.  I guess I picked out the lucky random seed in the pack.  The pumpkins did not grown huge, but they were a decent size (about 10 pound each) and the plant produced lots of them.  A storm was heading in, so I was forced to harvest my pumpkins before they were ready.  Only 3 out of the 15 pumpkins were orange, the rest of them being a very dark green.  We thought that we would be able to just carve the green pumpkins anyway (for Halloween), but it turned out to be such a daunting task, that we just gave up.

I read that if you leave the pumpkins out in the sun, they’ll ripen.  I did this for about a week, but after that I didn’t think it was worth the time.  So on the kitchen floor they sat.  It wasn’t the prettiest sight to behold, but I didn’t know what else to do with them.  After about a month, I noticed them starting to turn orange.  Every one of those hunter green pumpkins ripened.  Then I was faced with the challenge of what to do with 10 (we used 5 for Halloween) ripened pumpkins.  Roast them!

The Pumpkin Challenge:

I thought roasting them was the perfect idea.  I could puree the meat and freeze it for later use.  After hacking through 2 pumpkins, I realized that this idea wasn’t as fun and exciting as I thought it would be.  First, I had to safely cut through the pumpkin and then I had to scrape out the seeds and guts.  What was I thinking?  Cutting through a winter squash is one of the most unpleasant things I’ve done.  I thought that there had to be a better way.  I thought for a minute and wondered what would happen if I cooked the whole pumpkin without halving and gutting it.  I wondered if they might explode in the oven from pressure, so I made sure that at my first attempt, I poked slits in the top of the pumpkin a few times with a knife.  I cooked it and voila, the pumpkin did not explode, the guts were easy to scoop out with a spoon, and the meat was just as easy to scoop out as well. I noticed the skin was a weird brittle texture, and the meat seemed to separate from the skin a bit, almost giving it a deflated look (see picture above).  I thought that maybe it was possible to cook the whole pumpkin without even adding slits to the top.  This time I only rinsed the pumpkin off, cleaning any dirt away from the skin, placed it on a cookie sheet and popped it in the oven. Ha! It worked.  I don’t know why I never thought of this before.  I reflected on the many times I painstakingly cut through a butternut squash.  How much easier it would have been if I just cooked the uncut squash first and seasoned the meat later.

Roasting a Pumpkin -- Whole:

1-2 pumpkins

cookie sheet

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Wash your pumpkin(s) in the sink with water, cleaning them of any debris.
3. Place pumpkin(s) on a cookie sheet and put it in the oven on the middle rack.
4. Cook for 60-90 minutes, turn the oven off, and leave the pumpkins in the oven until they are cooled down enough to handle.
5. Set the cookie sheet on the stove top, cut off the top or cut the whole pumpkin in half , scoop out the seeds and guts and discard.  It’s not necessary to scoop out every single stringy part.  It all will be eventually pureed.
6. Scoop out the meat into a large bowl.
7. Puree meat while still warm either in a blender or with a stick blender.  I use a stick blender to cut down on the dirty dishes.
8. Divide into freezer bags and freeze, or store in fridge for up to 4 days.

Pumpkin Guts

Pumpkin Meat

Pumpkin Puree

One volleyball sized pumpkin yields roughly 6 cups of pumpkin puree.

*It is so much easier if you puree the meat right away while it is still warm. 

So what do you do with pumpkin?

I think we’ve all been here:  buying a can or two of pureed pumpkin for the holidays and then finding out someone else is bringing the pumpkin pie.  So what do you do with the pumpkin?  Stick it in the far back corner of your pantry until next year?  

There was a time where I thought you could only bake a homemade pumpkin pie or maybe a pumpkin roll or a pumpkin cheesecake if you’re feeling a little adventurous, but that’s about it.  Believe it or not, there are actually quite a few things that pumpkin (and pumpkin puree) can be used for:

Cookies

Sweet Bread

Yeast Bread

Rolls

Pancakes

Waffles

Oatmeal

Pumpkin Butter

Cake

Pie

Pumpkin Fries (yes this involves cutting the pumpkin)

Soup

and even more…

There are many different types of pumpkins and sugar pumpkins are used for making pumpkin pie, giving you the sweetest result.  Store bought pumpkin puree is made from pumpkins that have a similar sweetness to sugar pumpkins.  Many canned varieties are made from Dickinson Squash, that is not technically a pumpkin, but has a deep orange flesh with a sweet taste.  “Regular” types of pumpkins will produce a more subtle taste…not so pumpkin "y".