Pumpkins are a staple of autumn decorating. Many households sit a few pumpkins on their front step and often carve them into jack-o’-lanterns for Halloween.
Yet pumpkins have much more value than being a mere decoration on the front step. They’re a creative tool for gardening and even a simple addition to a cozy fall meal.
If you have several pumpkins on your front step, here are five great ways to make use of them.
Bake the removed seeds for a healthy and tasty snack. As anyone who has carved a pumpkin knows, the insides of a typical pumpkin are loaded with seeds. It’s easy to just toss these seeds, but they actually make for a very tasty snack.
Just take all of the seeds out of the pumpkin, clean them thoroughly (a strainer helps with this), then dry them all with a paper towel. For every cup of seeds that you have, melt two teaspoons of butter and mix in a pinch of salt (and any additional seasonings you might want). Dredge the seeds through this mix, then lay them on a baking sheet. Bake them at 300 F in an oven for about 45 minutes.
The seeds come out deliciously crisp and flavorful. A small bag of these make for a great autumn snack, especially when they’re still warm.
Use the pulp for vegetable stock. The rest of the material that you scoop out of the pumpkin is the pulp, and while it’s not particularly tasty to prepare on its own, it does make a great ingredient in vegetable stock.
My family keeps a “vegetable scraps” Ziploc bag in the freezer with cooked and uncooked extra vegetable pieces. We just add the pulp to this bag.
When the bag is full, we put the contents in a slow cooker, then add water until there’s about two inches covering all the vegetables. We add a bit of salt, ground black pepper and even a few peppercorns and a bit of garlic. Then we turn it on low and allow it to cook all day or overnight — at least eight hours, if not more. At that point, we pour the mix through a strainer and save the liquid.
That liquid left behind is vegetable stock, and it’s absolutely delicious. It can provide the base for soups, casseroles and other dishes throughout the year. You can easily freeze it, too, and use it when you need it.
Puree the flesh, and use it for culinary purposes. All the fleshy material that forms the wall of the pumpkin (except for the outermost rind) is also worth eating, particularly with smaller pumpkins.
Just slice the pumpkin in half, and place each half on a baking sheet sliced face down. Bake at 350 F for 60 minutes to soften the pumpkin. You can then scoop the flesh right off the rind easily.
That flesh can be used in innumerable ways. I usually puree it in a blender or food processor and use it for soups or casseroles or even “mashed pumpkin” instead of mashed potatoes. You can, of course, also use it for pumpkin pie filling with some added sugar and pumpkin pie spice.
Use a pumpkin as a festive planter. Pumpkins also serve as great self-composting planters. Simply cut the top off, scoop out the seeds and pulp, and add some dirt. Then put an annual plant right on top.
The nice thing about this method is that the pumpkin works well for composting when it starts to soften. Just bury the entire thing in the ground, and it will provide nutrients for the new small plant.
Use small pumpkins as festive soup bowls. If you have a few miniature pumpkins, consider using them as soup bowls for your festive holiday meals. Simply cut the top off a small bowl-sized pumpkin, scoop out the seeds and flesh, and use it as a bowl for soup.
The flavor of the soup will be absorbed into the pumpkin and a bit of the pumpkin flavor will find its way into the soup, making both extra delicious.
Not only that, you can still use that mini pumpkin for other things, such as for planting or baking.
Those pumpkins on your front step are beautiful decorations for the season, but they can also be a resource for frugal (and delicious) living. Enjoy!
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5 Money-Saving Uses for Pumpkins originally appeared on usnews.com
