Shawna Coronado's Pumpkin Harvest

Also, happy World Pasta Day!  Good grief, so much going on.  We better get right into

Penne with Basil and Pumpkin Bechamel

Wow…so let’s see…  This recipe is my #meatlessmonday post for Meatless Monday. 

It’s also the last of the 2009 Nude & Eco-Cheap Cooking recipes for this year (boo!  I know, I’m bummed.)  I’d team up with the awesome Shawna Coronado for any cooking challenge anywhere and I am going to miss all her delicious veggies.  Still, as winter touches the Midwest, all her nude (no chemicals) eco-friendly veggies are going away and without the veggies, it’s hard to feed a family of four for less then $10.50! 

But, if she’s up for it, I’m would love to see a 2010 Nude & Eco-Cheap Cooking Initiative!

Oh, and before I forget,  it’s also World Pasta Day, which can only be celebrated by eating pasta.  Which is how we get to this crazy recipe  I dreamed up. 

Making Penne with Basil and Pumpkin Bechamel

This recipe is going to be a tiny bit time consuming since we’re going to make our own pumpkin puree with fresh out-of-the-garden pumpkin.  You can substitute canned, but it won’t be as good or as cheap!  After that, it’s merely a case of making the bechamel and eating.

You will need:

• 1 Sugar Pie Pumpkin (free from Shawna’s garden)
• 2 tablespoons olive oil (free for the challenge)
• Salt and pepper (free for the challenge)
• 1 package penne ($3.00)
• 2 tablespoons butter (50 cents)
• 2 tablespoons flour (free for the challenge)
• 3 cups heavy cream at room temperature ($5.00)
• Pinch of nutmeg (25 cents)
• 4-6 leaves basil, sliced thinly (free from Shawna’s garden)

That’s a total of $8.75!  Another successful challenge.

Preheat your oven to 350.

Cut the pumpkin in half, remove the seeds and coat with olive oil.  Then sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper.  Put the pumpkin on a cookie sheet cut side down and roast for 45 minutes or until fork tender.  Then remove from the oven.

Once it’s cool enough, peel the pumpkin, cut it into chunks and puree in the food processor.  If the puree is too thick, you can loosen it with a little water, broth, or cream.  Add a little extra salt and taste for flavor.  It’s not going to taste like pie or anything because it’s not seasoned for that.  It should have a mild, earthly flavor instead.

Next, prepare the pasta to package directions in well salted water.  Remove while al dente.

When the pasta is cooking, melt the butter in a skillet over a medium flame.  When the butter is melted, mix in the two tablespoons of flour to form a paste.  Continue to cook for about 30-60 seconds or until you get a nutty aroma.  Then pour in the room temperature cream and let it get warm.   Finally, add the pumpkin and let the sauce thicken.

Serve the sauce on the penne.  Top with basil.

And enjoy this final 2009 Nude & Eco-Cheap Cooking recipe!

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Shawna Coronado's Pumpkin Harvest

Yep, that’s right.  It’s another #meatlessmonday and another installment of the 2009 Nude & Echo-Cheap Cooking Initiative.  Today we’re making

Pumpkin Soup

If you’re not familiar with the 2009 Nude & Eco-Cheap Cooking Initiative, that’s where I take the delicious veggies grown by the always awesome Shawna Coronado and turn them into a meal for a family of four that costs less than $11.50.  Can I do it?

Yes I can with this easy, but delicious pumpkin soup.

I actually love pumpkin season.  I think it’s kind of a shame that it only seems to be popular for about two months.  Still, every year people go NUTS for pumpkins: pumpkin desserts, pumpkin soups, pumpkin coffee drinks, pumpkin pizza, and so on.  Then even before the Thanksgiving leftovers are done…BOOM… everyone’s on to peppermint or sugar cookies or some other Christmas phase.  Anyway, I’m ranting.

The good news is that for the next month or so we can continue to enjoy pumpkin recipes like this one.

Making Pumpkin Soup

This recipe is so easy, but it takes a little while to make because you want to cook the pumpkin before you put it into the soup.  Boiled pumpkin sounds ridiculously unappetizing and the stuff would take forever to boil anyway. So, instead, you need to bake it first.  Once it’s ready, the rest of the soup is a breeze.

You will need:

• 1 pumpkin, halved and seeded (free from Shawna’s garden)
• 8 tablespoons olive oil, divided (free as part of the challenge)
• 1 loaf bread ($2.00)
• 1 clove of garlic (5 cents)
• 1 medium yellow (non-sweet) onion, 1/4 inch dice (free from Shawna’s garden)
• 16 ounces of mushrooms, cleaned and sliced ($3.50)
• 2 teaspoons black pepper
• 6 cups broth ($1.50)
• 2 cups heavy cream ($3.50)
• 4 leaves basil, thinly sliced (free from Shawna’s garden)

Total: $10.55 (cream is expensive, but still made it!!)

Heat your oven to 350 degrees.  Cover both halves of the pumpkin in about two tablespoons of olive oil and sprinkle with a bit of salt.  Bake for forty-five minutes cut side down or until the pumpkin is fork tender.

When the pumpkin is finished, let it cool and then cut into a small dice and set aside.

Next, cut the loaf of bread in half and then cut into 2 inch wide pieces. Rub with the cut clove of garlic and drizzle with olive oil.

In a soup pot, add 2 tablespoons of olive oil then saute the onions until they start to turn translucent.  Then add the mushrooms and cook them until the are brown and shriveled.  Add the black pepper and the broth and bring to a boil.    (At this point, put the bread in the oven and keep an eye on it.  You will want to remove it when it gets brown.)

When the broth is boiling, add the cream and bring the soup back to a boil.

Finally, add the pumpkin and let it get warm. 

Serve with the basil on top of the soup and enjoy!

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I knew if I needed to find the official drink of unResolution month, she would have it.  And, as usual, I was not disappointed:

Pumpkin Pie Preggatini

Though this recipe was featured on her blog, she also has a book out called Preggatinis: Mixology for the Mom-to-be, a collection of non-alcoholic drinks which look absolutely delicious. And while the book says its for the mom-to-be, it’s also great for anyone who does not drink or cannot have alcohol for whatever reason.  (Personally, I would have called it Delicious Designated Driving but that’s just me…)

Anyway, when I was mapping out what I was going to do for the “A month is four weeks, which is 28 days BUT January has 31 days so I need to find 3 more days worth of delicious but unhealthy foods” section of unResolution month, I just knew this was the drink for me because I love pumpkin and this one does not shy away from the calories.

The Pumpkin Pie Preggatini Drink

You can get the recipe and instructions for this drink or a bunch of others off her site, but lest you think I am falling down on the job, I wanted to hightlight some ingredients in this drink, in particular condensed milk, syrup, whipped cream, and graham crackers which pretty much means it’s a little slice of dessert in a cold cocktail glass.  Even the image of the drink on her blog looks absolutely amazing and I hope everyone goes out and makes their own.

Guys, if the title of the drink makes you feel weird, forget the preggatini part.  Think of it as a way to get your pumpkin pie without having to take time to get up off the couch, cut a slice of pie, and put in on a plate.  It’s very manly to save time like that, right?

Okay, get to mixing and enjoy!

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Recipe: Pumpkin Risotto

For some reason, there is just something right about combining creamy risotto with pumpkin.  I think it has to do with the fact that even though I have been cooking with pumpkin a lot recently, in my head, pumpkin is still synonymous with pumpkin puree, which is creamy itself, especially when combined with eggs, butter, and sugar.

How to Cook Pumpkin

However, before we get into the recipe, let’s take a minute to talk about cooking with pumpkin.  It’ll be painless I promise.

There are a number of ways to cook pumpkin: boiling, steaming, and stir frying.  However, the method that always works well for me is roasting it in the oven.  Every time it produces well-cooked, juicy, and delicious pumpkin.  Roasting is also easy, but it is time consuming.

To roast all you need to do is cut your pumpkin in half, clean out the seeds, cover in a little olive oil, salt, and pepper and bake in a 450 degree oven for 45 minutes.

How to Pick a Pumpkin

One other note.  Then recipe, I promise.

When you are looking to eat pumpkin, look for sugar pie pumpkin or organic pumpkin from a quality grocery store like a Whole Foods.  Most of the pumpkins that you find in a pumpkin patch or in a lot of grocery stores were bred to be hardy and stay together as scary faces are cut into them.  This makes for tough, stringy pumpkin and not good for eating.

Pumpkin Risotto

Phew!

Okay, now without further ado…Pumpkin Risotto.

• 6 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup cooked pumpkin (1/5-1/8 of a cook sugar pie pumpkin) finely diced
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 2 cups arborio rice
• 4-6 cups of veggie or chicken broth
• 1/4 cup of parmesan cheese (optional for non-vegans)
• 4 tablespoons of butter (optional for non-vegans)
• Nutmeg for garnish

Put a high sided skillet or sauce pan over medium heat and add 2 tablespoons of olive oil.  Wait until the olive oil is hot and add the garlic.  Saute for 30 seconds and add the pumpkin and a good pinch of salt.   Saute for about three minutes and set aside.

Add the remaining olive oil and wait until it is hot.  Add the onions and a pinch of salt and cook until translucent, 4-5 minutes.  Then add the arborio rice.  Stir well, making sure the onions and rice are covered in oil.  Toast the rice for another 3 minutes.

Bring the heat down to medium.  Using a soup ladel or measuring cup, add about two ladels (somewhere between a half cup and a cup) of broth into the rice.  Give the rice a stir.

The broth should start to boil and will soon be absorbed into rice.  When the rice is dry, ladel in more broth.  Repeat until the rice is no longer able to absorb any more liquid.  (It’s better to over do it, in my opinion, than under do it so don’t worry about adding too much.  If the risotto is too runny, just cook the risotto a little longer.)

When the rice is at capacity, let it cook for another minute, then stir in the cheese and butter.  Once the cheese has been incorporated, add the cooked pumpkin/garlic mixture and stir well.

Serve immediately with some nice crusty bread and side salad.

Enjoy!

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But You Said Pumpkin

That’s right.  Baingan Bharta is traditionally made with eggplant, but this is Fall and stores are so full of pumpkin that there is no room for shoppers.  So, in the hopes of eating seasonal, I thought it might be fun to swap out eggplant for pumpkin.  (This is, of course, not a decision I take lightly, me since I really love eggplant.)

I also played with the spice blend just a little.  Whenever I cook with pumpkin, I try to use nutmeg, allspice, and sometimes cinnamon because those spices typically go with pumpkin (think pumpkin pie.)  In this case, I added ground coriander because it can be used as a nutmeg substitute and it is very Indian.

Pumpkin Baingan Bharta

• 2.5 pounds pumpkin, cut into 1 inch squares
• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• Salt and pepper
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• 1 tablespoon minced ginger
• 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
• 1 medium onion, sliced
• 1 tablespoon curry powder
• 2 teaspoons ground coriander
• 1 can of plum tomatoes, chopped
• 1/2 cup, yogurt or heavy cream
• 1 Serrano chili, diced
• 3 tablespoons cilantro, finely chopped

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

Coat the pumpkin in 2 tablespoons of olive oil, salt, and pepper.  Bake the pumpkin in the oven for 45 minutes.

Mix the garlic and ginger in a food processor with just enough water to form a smooth paste.  This can be done with any quantity of ginger and garlic.  It can also be made by mashing the garlic and ginger with a knife.

Put the remaining oil in a skillet and heat over a medium flame.  Toast the cumin seeds for 1 minute.  Add the onions and cook until they become soft, which usually takes 3-5 minutes.

Add the garlic ginger paste, curry powder, coriander, and chopped tomatoes.  Reserve the tomato juice.  Cook for 2 minutes.

Add the pumpkin, tomato juice, yogurt, and chilies.  Cover and cook for five minutes.  Remove the lid and continue cooking until the sauce thickens, typically about 10 minutes.

Add the cilantro and cook for another thirty seconds and serve with rice and naan.

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With her Southern belle smile, she announced she was going to make a pumpkin cheesecake.  While she had me at “Hey y’all,” I sat in rapt attention as she made this recipe.

I had never made a cheesecake before.  I made that cheesecake.

I can bake.  Who knew?

If you decide to try it, follow the baking instructions exactly.  That’s my best advice.  My second best advice would that next time I make the recipe, I am going to add a half cup more sugar and double the spice.  I like my pumpkin pies bold with big flavors.  Paula’s pumpkin cheesecake was good, but it did not explode with sweetness, nutmeg, and clove like I prefer.  That is not Paula’s fault.  Everyone else who has tried the recipe loved it and wanted more. 

And besides, it’s a Paula Deen dessert.  You know it has to be good!

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