Thursday, October 7, 2010

Welcome to Pumpkin Time!!!!


I LOVE pumpkin!!! I just love how bright and cheerful they look. Seeing them begin to populate the grocery stores and farmers markets tells me that Halloween is coming soon with all it's mystery and spooky goodness.

I guess you could say I'm a Pumpkin head - although I prefer Pumpkinaholic. I love to carve pumpkins for decoration, cook them for everything from appetizers to dips to dinner to dessert, make

Honey Pumpkin Face Mask, and just have them around to look pretty and bright.

I also enjoy experimenting with these favorite Autumn squashes. Last year I tried make pumpkin jelly, but it didn't really work. It never really jelled and had a rather slimy and gloppy consistency. It did make a great Halloween prop though!

This year, I'm going to expand my pumpkin experimentation by trying something Native Americans did with pumpkin skin. Native Americans would take the skins, cut them into strips and dry them and weave them into mats.

My other experiment will be the predecessor of pumpkin pie. During the Colonial times, they would scoop out the seeds of the pumpkin, then add milk and spices and place the whole pumpkin in the hot embers to cook. This makes a type of pudding, which is basically the filling of pumpkin pie. In fact, the Colonials used to use pumpkin mush as an ingredient in their pie shells. I don't know if I'll be that brave, but when Pumpkin fever strikes, you never know what can happen! I'll keep you posted!

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