Pumpkins!

I am a sucker for pumpkins.  Usually I can hold off buying them until October.  But this year when I saw those cute little pie pumpkins, I caved.  I bought two, one for each of the girls. This was last week.  And either I picked a bad pumpkin, repeated dropping on the tile floor or the cozy corner of the kitchen where they patiently waited to be cut into did not suit one of the pumpkins.  It was partially rotten when I checked them this morning.  I saved what I could of it and tossed all the seeds, but after roasting it, the flavor was still off so that whole one is ending up in the compost pile.  Its friend though tastes delicious. 

 The girls got to help by taking out the pumpkin seeds for me.  They lost interest pretty quick.  Still, it is nice to include them in the kitchen/cooking activities and it kept them busy for a short time.

 

Maybe with more practice they will be bigger helps this fall, and if not, there is always next year (or the year after).  After I finished up gutting the pumpkins for the girls, I quartered them and put them in the oven at 350 for 45 minutes.  I didn't want to oil them because I want it to be just pumpkins in the puree.  That turned out fine, nothing stuck to the pan.  I put the seeds in oven for the last ten minutes with a little salt and olive oil.  Next time I'll try 13 minutes because they weren't as crisp as I like them to be.  I was trying to avoid burning them like I have in the past. 

 

 

The flesh is really easy to scrape off the pumpkin skin once it is cooked.  I whirred it in the food processor until smooth and separated it into two plastic zip bags for the freezer.  Now I will be able to try out a pumpkin granola recipe and bake some cookies.  We will get more pumpkins when we go to the pumpkin patch and those will be destined for pie.  I'm so glad making this puree was easy and good.  It will make things that much easier this holiday season.  And with baby C on the way, I need to have things like this prepared ahead of time.