What do you do with pumpkins?

[MyOtherProfile]

Toby Jones is narrating some programme about the Fens right now. He just said pumpkins are grown primarily for decoration. Why is this? In France and other places pumpkins are grown for food - soup, roast, mash etc. Smaller tasty ones, not these massive bland ones. Seems like a waste to grow them just to chop bits out for one day a year. Anyone else actually cook them like me?

I do. Roast pumpkin, or soup is very nice

Soup!

Stuff them with sausage meat and breadcrumbs and bake.

Also I make pumpkin pie, although I'm the only one who likes it.😊

Roast pumpkin or pumpkin risotto.

Carving pumpkins taste like cotton wool so we don’t eat them but we eat masses of squash in the autumn and winter. Crown Prince is my favourite. I usually roast it.

Soup, pie etc. Also I roast the seeds with various seasonings, they make an amazing snack.

I really hate the wastefulness around pumpkins now.

I think because the huge orange ones don't taste very nice? Quite watery and more seeds than flesh. But there are lots of tastier varieties but they aren't as widely available. I love spicy pumpkin soup or roasted or in risotto.

Wasteful? About half an hour to an hour of family activity then the joy of lighting them up and seeing them on the doorstep for a week or so - my kids are late teens and still enjoy doing it. Just because it's not eaten doesn't mean it's wasteful.
I wouldn't eat this type but you can roast the seeds.

There is an animal sanctuary near us which takes carved pumpkins after Hallowe’en and uses them for feed.

I also find it concerning we grow that many pumpkins, transport and store them all, just to throw away. The ones on sale for carving at Halloween taste gross.

We do buy edible pumpkins - make soup or risotto, or just eat as a roast vegetable, or in a veg stew.

I did try cooking with them once after we'd finished carving a Jack O'Lantern with dd. Getting rid of the seeds was a horrible slimy job and none of us liked the soup or pie. After that year, they just got chucked on the compost heap.

The carving pumpkins taste gross, proper pumpkins taste nice.

I roast pumpkins or make curried pumpkin and carrot soup, enough for a year and i freeze.

Where do people find edible ones? The ones that appear in the supermarket for carving taste crap.

I grow my own use them for decoration give them away if I have enough. I make soup, curry or pumpkin baked oats for breakfast. Pumpkin freezes well so I chop loads and add it to other veg soups.

@PinkBallPit

Where do people find edible ones? The ones that appear in the supermarket for carving taste crap.

Our farm shop sells nice ones, we get different colours and sizes.

Not cheap though! But is once per year and a tradition. The nasty orange ones are ridiculously cheap.

I chop the Halloween pumpkin up, freeze it, then add it to homemade dog food whenever my dog has a upset stomach or diarrhoea.

I love it when the pumpkins and squashes appear in the supermarket. My family get a bit sick of them by the end because I do go a bit mad and buy a few each week but they keep in the cupboard for ages. I like to try out as many different different ones as I can whilst they’re about. I hate seeing people decorate the munchkin ones because they’re delicious and hard to get hold of when you actually want to eat them.

I’ve made savoury and sweet scones and muffins, tea bread, pancakes, soup, stew, hollowed out the munchkin ones and stuffed with chorizo, spinach and cream and roasted them for dinner, risotto, pasta sauces… I love autumn, can’t wait.

Actual pumpkin has a horrid taste.

Other squash : great and eaten as Pp. suggest.

There is a pumpkin and ginger muffin that is quite nice, with enough ginger to cover that pumpkin taste.

We pick ours at a local farm but still find it’s more seeds than flesh inside, perhaps because we choose larger ones? I’m not sure. There isn’t enough flesh to make anything useful.

@ShingleBeach

Actual pumpkin has a horrid taste.

Other squash : great and eaten as Pp. suggest.

There is a pumpkin and ginger muffin that is quite nice, with enough ginger to cover that pumpkin taste.

Actual pumpkin doesn't though. It's just that so many grown here are grown so big they lose their nice taste.

So glad to find lots of people who do cook pumpkin and squash.

It's quite hard to find actual nice small tasty pumpkin varieties in my experience. Those of you who have - I'm guessing not at your local supermarket?

@PinkBallPit

Where do people find edible ones? The ones that appear in the supermarket for carving taste crap.

You need to ignore the big boxes of pumpkins and look on the shelves in the veg department. There are always assorted squash, including small pumpkins, from September onwards. Aldi is particularly good for the very small ‘munchkin’ pumpkins. They keep for ages so I use a few in display and then roast them individually to serve one per person. No waste!

It's quite hard to find actual nice small tasty pumpkin varieties in my experience. Those of you who have - I'm guessing not at your local supermarket?

I get a veg box from a local farm, and get small, tasty pumpkins in there.

Dcs are long grown up but I still put a pumpkin in the window every year since we usually get a number of T or T’ers. I hate waste so it’s always turned into Thai style soup the next day - plenty of onion, garlic, red chilli and ginger, and coconut milk.

I’d never buy one just to eat, though - to me they’re pretty tasteless fillers that need loads of flavour added.