Where’s My Fairy Godmother?

I think I just turned into a pumpkin. The clock did strike 12 but only 12 noon, not midnight!

Do you buy pumpkins in the fall to decorate your house? I do. One small one every year. I just feel sad to spend my money on a perfectly good pumpkin I’ll throw away in a few months.

I’ve considered fake pumpkins so I can keep them from year to year, but they’re fake. They look fake and I have to find a year-round home for them in my garage. Not gonna happen.

So as promised – I’m telling you how I’m learning to waste not, want not. This year I decided to put my pumpkin to good use.

I bought a sugar pumpkin. Don’t let the name fool you. These babies are work horses. They are great for baking.

I noticed my pumpkin was starting to look a little sad. Since Christmas is coming and I’m done with pumpkins, I decided the day had arrived to put the poor thing out of it’s misery. I chopped it in half.

ROASTING THE SEEDS:

I learned a neat little trick to quickly separate the seeds from the stringy goo. Use a fork to scrape them out. I put the seeds in a strainer and gave them a good washing while rubbing them together between my fingers. Bye bye goo! Then I poured the seeds into a ziploc bag, drizzled in a bit of olive oil, a sprinkling of salt and a dash of cajun seasoning salt – love that stuff! Shake, shake, shake and onto the cookie sheet they went for a forty-five minute roast in a 300 degree oven.

Yum!

My only regret? I wish I’d roasted these on a Saturday. I can only imagine them hot out of the oven accompanied by a cold Coke and a UT football game. Hook ‘em horns!

I’d show you a picture, but they were so delicious I ate them all before snapping a shot.

PUREEING THE MEAT:

The meat of the pumpkin was not so simple. I have very nice smooth knives (thanks mom!), but I found that a serrated knife was more effective to cut away the skin and cut off the remaining strings of goo. However, my serrated knife is very cheap and very dull. An hour later I was finished.

I cut the pumpkin meat into chunks, placed it in my saucepan and poured in about an inch of water. I simmered it on the stove about thirty minutes and mashed it with a wooden spoon. Voila! Beautiful pumpkin puree.

Pumpkins have a nasty reputation to create stringy puree. I didn’t trust the lovely puree in front of me, so I pushed it through my metal strainer. It was waisted effort. It all came through beautifully – no strings to be found. I think the sugar pumpkin variety accounts for this.

MAKING PUMPKIN BUTTER:

I found myself in an important quandry: what to do with two cups of lovely pumpkin puree?

Bake a pie perhaps?

We hold one thing sacred at our house this time of year. Pumpkin pie. Don’t mess with the pumpkin pie.

Ms. Libby makes a wonderful pumpkin puree I depend on for a tasty pie. She pumps out millions of cans and has been doing so for oodles of years. I don’t trust my pumpkin puree to live up to her standards. Besides her cans only cost a dollar.

So no pumpkin pie for my puree. No! I wanted something special!…adventurous!…for my pumpkin puree. This occasion called for pumpkin butter.

Did you know the USDA says not to can pumpkin butter at home? Apparently you can get all kinds of bacterial ickies this way. See! Your tax dollars ARE hard at work here in the U.S. of A.

However, supposedly you can freeze pumpkin butter. According to my Ball canning brand cookbook, modern canning jars are made to withstand freezer temperatures. Only use tapered jars for this purpose. They are better designed for the job.

After a bit of quick searching on the internet I found and adapted this recipe for pumpkin butter:

2 cups pumpkin puree

1/2 cup applesauce

1/2 cup brown sugar

3 tablespoons white sugar

1/2 tablespoon ground cinnamon

1/2 tablespoon allspice

1/4 tablespoon ground cloves

1/4 tablespoon ground nutmeg

1/4 tablespoon ground ginger

Stir together in a saucepan. Heat to boiling over high heat stirring constantly. Once boiling, turn heat to low and simmer for about forty-five minutes until thickened. Stir frequently. Ladle into clean eight ounce jars and freeze or refrigerate for storage. Makes about 24 ounces. NOTE: After trying this recipe, I would adjust the allspice to a lesser amount. Allspice has a funky peppery taste that was too strong, in my opinion, in this recipe.

SUMMARY:

I now am the proud owner of twenty-four ounces of pumpkin butter. My tummy is the proud owner of the roasted pumpkin seeds.

Would I do it again?

Well, maybe. But only if my fairy godmother (or my real mother) brings me a sharp serrated knife.

Tags: Canning Pumpkin Butter, Roasting Pumpkin Seeds