You can tell that we here at Slashfood are knee-deep in autumn: some of us are swilling pumpkin beer and mixing pumpkin cocktails; some of us are making comfort food from soup to pot pie; and no few of us are stuffing Halloween candy into our mouths. So what better time to share a slim, marvelous volume devoted to recipes and techniques for autumn's centerpiece ingredient?

Yes, a pumpkin is a squash (and squashes, by the way, are gourds), and so are crooknecks, acorns, butternuts, zucchinis, chayotes, pattypans, carnivals and all of the summer and winter squashes that take center stage in A Harvest of Pumpkins and Squash. The book begins with cookbook author Lou Seibert Pappas' thoughts on squash, from their history to their purchase and preparation, followed by a wonderful and useful squash glossary (squashary?). From there we proceed to squash recipes (squashipes?).

Continue reading A Harvest of Pumpkins and Squash, Cookbook of the Day

Continue reading Pumpkin cocktail

• You'll need an ice cream maker (there are even ball shaped models that can be kicked around at partie, though I have never tried one) and a good pumpkin grown for its meat, rather than just its appearance.

• This can be a family endeavor-- messy. In this typical ice cream recipe I would add two cups of good and mashed pumpkin meat. Not too stringy. Make the ice cream and then serve it the carved out pumpkin, lid and all.

This is a banner year in Millsboro, Del. - it's the 20th anniversary of the famed Punkin Chunkin contest. Inventors and miscreants from all over seek to toss a pumpkin the farthest (up to 4,000 feet for the superstars). It may not be culinary, but it uses up those leftover pumpkins (with their stringy flesh so inferior to butternut squash), and it legitimizes the pastimes of those who spend Halloween surreptitiously hurling pumpkins stolen from their neighbors' porches. Piece of useless trivia: it's called "pie" when your pumpkin releases from the cannon already in pieces. Fire in the hole.

My husband and my long-time ex-boyfriend have very little in common. One thing they do share, however, is an aversion to savory squash dishes. No matter how lovingly I'd prepare, say, acorn squash stuffed with lentils, or butternut soup flavored with paprika and cumin; they'd both turn up their noses. "Pumpkin is just for pies," each would say. My husband, the more generous of the two (hence his status as my husband), would gamely take a serving. And barely make a dent.

"I love you, I just can't eat savory squash," was the message. Come dessert time, the pumpkin pies and pumpkin cheesecakes would disappear in a whirlwind of whipped cream, my gourmet ways with squash finally appreciated. I wonder: is this a guy thing? Or do some people just come hard-wired to appreciate both the sweet and the savory aspects of these velvety winter veggies? Will you eat your pumpkin spicy?

I love pumpkin pie. I bake pumpkin pie, I eat pumpkin pie at every holiday gathering, I take home leftover pumpkin pie and have it for breakfast. In the time between the start of Halloween festivities (which seems to start earlier and earlier every year) and the holidays at the end of the year, I'll have overdosed on pumpkin pie, swearing that I'll never eat it again. (Until next October, of course.)

So in an effort to add some variety to the fall/winter dessert repertoire, I bake a pumpkin cheesecake at least once. It's a little more work than the evaporated milk and canned pumpkin that go into a pie, but what else would I be doing on a Saturday night?!

Continue reading Pumpkin Pie Overdose? - Pumpkin Cheesecake

 I think our esteemed team leader down the pumpkin patch gulag was under the impression I was going to do a post on pumpkin AND chocolate!

Not on your life! Having already subjected my taste buds to such delights as Citrouille au Jammon De Bayonne and Nigel Slater's Spiced Pumpkin Soup with Bacon (have I mentioned that I really don't like pumpkin.. .or swede, or parsnips or mushy peas come to that??) there is only one thing that will save me know - Chocolate Pumpkin!

Oh yes baby... come to the scribbler....

(Orange flavoured chocolate pumpkin filled with orange and milk chocolate drops, £6.99 from Pa Pa Paa)

I've eaten my way through most of the squash alphabet, starting with "acorn" and "butternut" and working my way down to "spaghetti" and "turban." I've also sliced, peeled, and hacked my way into them. It's sometimes a challenge, and other times downright dangerous (but I still have all my fingers, so I've got that going for me). I've found a couple of things:

• most squashes are interchangeable in recipes
  
• most squashes are hard to cut
• all squashes can be cooked the same way, if recipes escape you: slice them in half, scoop out the seeds, place cut side down on a baking sheet, bake at 350 degrees until tender

Once the baked squash comes out of the oven, you can add butter and sugar, maybe nutmeg and cinnamon, for a sweet side dish; or fill with something savory, like lentils or rice pilaf. I love Indian and North African spices with squash; cumin, coriander, cloves, cayenne or chipotle pepper, ginger. I think squash is delicious, but I stay away from the big ones unless I'm making pies or soup for a crowd.

Continue reading Squash tutorial, from acorn to turban

• 1 lb. kabocha
• 4 cups prepared dashi soup stock (see dashi instructions)
  
• 3 tbsps sugar
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
  

• 4 cups dashi soup stock
• 1/2 a small kabocha, de-seeded and sliced thinly into 1 in. pieces
  
• 1/2 tofu
• 3 tbsp miso paste
• 1/4 cup chopped green onion

I know I keep on about Nigel Slater's Kitchen Diaries - it just seems to have hit a culinary nerve - but here is a recipe, in keeping with today's Pumpkin theme, recorded under February 20th.

Spiced Pumpkin Soup With Bacon

• a medium onion
• 2 plump cloves of garlic
• 50g butter
• 900g pumpkin
• 1 tablespoon coriander seeds
• 2 teaspoons cumin seeds
• 2 small dried chillies
• 1 litre chicken or vegetable stock
• 4 rashers smoked bacon
• 100ml single cream

Peel and roughly chop the onion. Peel and slice the garlic. Melt the butter and cook both onion and garlic until soft and translucent. Peel the pumpkin, remove the stringy bits and seeds and discard them with the peel. Chop into rough cubes and add to the onion. Cook until the pumpkin is golden brown at the edges.

Toast the coriander and cumin seeds in a small pan over a very low heat for about 2 minutes until the start to smell warm and nutty. Grind the roasted spices and add them with the crumble chillies to the onion and pumpkin. Cook for a minute or so then add the stock. Simmer for 20 minutes until the pumpkin is tender.

Fry the bacon in the pan in which you toasted the spices. It should be crisp. Cut into small pieces with scissors. Whiz the soup in a blender or processor until smooth. Pour in the cream and add salt and pepper as necessary. Return to the pan and bring almost to the boil. Serve piping hot with the bacon bits scattered on top. Serves 4.

[Photo Andrew Barrow]

"100% pure pumpkin" crows the Libby web site. They announce that they only use "a special variety of pumpkin called the Dickinson." But is that really pumpkin? Experts disagree. For one, it's not orange. The Dickinson Field squash belongs to a species known as Cucurbita moschata, sharing a genus (Cucurbita) with the Jack-O-Lantern pumpkins, but betraying its Halloween-y origins with a decidedly tan skin. A little like the butternut squash - and, in fact, the Dickinson cross-polinates with the butternut.

Despite its tan skin, the Dickinson has that lovely orange flesh you expect from your pumpkin (no artificial coloring necessary). It has all the vitamins and minerals you know and love. It tastes great (and - if you really want to know - those pretty orange-skinned pumpkins? they don't taste so good). It's just that the pumpkin on the label, the one with the bright orange skin, is a bit of a white lie.