Pumpkin Soup!
My favorite autumnal lunch!
I love pumpkin! It’s such a versatile vegetable. I wasn’t always a lover of this squash. In fact, I wasn’t a lover of any squash. But, as we age so do our taste buds and as our palates expand, if we’re open to it, we find that those flavors we once shunned can be pretty terrific. Pumpkin and Squash are on that list for me. I love it just diced, sprinkled with olive oil, salt & pepper and roasted in an oven. In fact, that’s just how my soup recipe starts out. Once the pumpkin has been roasted, I scoop the flesh away from the shell. I put it in my food processor along with a saute of mirepoix (25% carrot, 25% celery & 50% onion, all diced). I like to round out the flavor by also peeling, dicing and roasting a butternut squash. Back into the soup pot it goes along with a deep vegetable stock or some homemade chicken stock, enough to reach the consistency you like best, thin or thick. When I’m ready to serve it, I like to top it with a few of the roasted pumpkin seeds. These I do in the oven, salt, pepper, olive oil and a pinch of cayenne for heat. Warning though, if you roast these seeds ahead of time you may find by the time your soup is ready, the seeds are gone. They’re addictive! Here I’ve served my soup with a fresh sirloin burger, topped with some fresh Parmesan cheese. Try this soup for something different. You can even place a spoonful of heavy cream on top for an extra smooth cup. Without the cream this is a great soup for freezing. When the last of the pumpkins have gone and the ground is frozen solid, this is a great winter’s evening treat! Need better instruction or have pumpkins you just don’t know what to do with? Drop me an e-mail at ckloscak@sbcglobal.net, I’ve got tried and true pumpkin recipes that I’m more than happy to share with you.
