Thursday, September 8, 2011

Pumpkin Bisque

With fall hitting me with a vengeance, I'm always open to guest bloggers, so if you have something wonderful to share, please send me an email and we'll discuss it.


Today's guest blogger is Cheri Weeks from Mocha Martha's Musings.  If people like her Facebook page and sign up to follow her blog by 1:00pm PST on Friday 9/16/2011, she will hand pick one of her vintage cookbooks to give one of them. The winner will be picked randomly on Monday morning.  She can also be found on Twitter.

This year I planted a garden, I didn’t want to be one of those people who overwhelm the neighbors with squash so I just planted two… WOW! Squash are prolific things. Next year, we may need to cut that down, I see my kids plotting against me.

If you feel my pain, or your pumpkins are starting to look like my squash, this recipe may be a great one for you to try. A few years ago, I did something… well some would say it was a bit cruel, I say it was delicious! I cooked my children’s holiday pumpkin. My husband received a pumpkin from a friend for Halloween, my 5 year old very excitedly said, "Hey are we going to carve that?" My immediate response was "No, we're going to cook it!" Yes, I know …the stuff nightmares, and therapists careers, are made of. At any rate, I had been saving a recipe for baked pumpkin for a long time, but because I live in a home with squash haters, I needed to take it up a notch, i.e., they were not going to eat baked squash.

Since then I have modified the original recipe, this would work in a Crockpot with just about any squash, trust me my garden is full of it right now….

Pumpkin Bisque
Ingredients
1 2-3 pound pumpkin
4 cups chicken broth (canned or made from saved bones)
2 cups cream or half and half
1 head garlic peeled
1 shallot peeled and chopped
1 T salt
½  pepper
thyme
dash of nutmeg
1 pinch cayenne

Preheat oven to 375. Cut the top of an approx. 3 lb gourd and set aside, clean the inside, (save the seeds, they are great roasted with cinnamon, cumin and butter, and salt). Add, 4cups of chicken broth, 1 head of peeled garlic cloves, 1 peeled and chopped shallot, 1 teaspoon of salt, ½ teaspoon of pepper, and a sprig of thyme. Pop the top back on and place it in a baking dish and roasted the recovering jack-o-lantern for 2.5 hours on 375.

After baking remove the gourd, ladle the liquid, other ingredients and scoop the flesh into a blender and blend until smooth. Add the cream and stir in. Adjust the seasoning with salt, cayenne and nutmeg to your taste. To modify this recipe for your Crockpot, just add peeled chopped pumpkin to the crock with all ingredients except cream, puree when tender. The children didn’t hold it against me!

1 comment:

  1. I've found using butternut squash as a pumpkin replacement pleased my pumpkin loving squash haters. Think butternut pie, butternut pancakes, butternut soup, roasted butternut seeds, butternut bread & muffins... you get the idea.

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