Seminole Pumpkin - A Garden Favorite!

Seed catalogs are arriving now, so it's a good time to share one of my garden favorites with you, Seminole Pumpkin. I was enticed by the Baker Creek seed catalog description "The wild squash of the Everglades… sweet flesh … productive vines … resistant to insects and disease." Squash bugs are often attracted to my organic garden, and I'd lost hopes of growing my favorite butternut squash ever again. (Note: winter squash and pumpkins are in the same vegetable family). But Seminole Pumpkin gave me new hope, and I figured a plant native to the Everglades should find happiness in my hot, humid Tennessee garden. So I ordered a package of seeds in late 2012.


Big squash plants need lots of space for their vines to spread, so I ended up only growing one Seminole Pumpkin plant in the 2013 summer garden (two are recommended, for optimal pollination). But it proved true to its description, growing strong with no damage by insects, and giving me a good harvest of about 5 big fruit, shaped much like bird house gourds. It was a lovely plant too, with large distinctive variegated leaves and huge yellow flowers (edible by the way). I enjoyed the taste just as well as butternut squash, so more good points for the pumpkin.

This past season I left the vegetable garden unplanted, as I renourished the depleted soil. Low and behold, in early summer a couple of healthy plants began to grow out of my compost bin, and I recognized the leaf as that of the Seminole Pumpkin. Evidently, some of the seeds discarded in the compost bin when I cooked the vegetable the previous fall had survived. Never one to throw away a good healthy plant (which explains why I have too many flower gardens!), I carefully dug three seedlings and planted them in the big pile of rich composted mulch from a nearby mushroom factory, which had been left from tilling some into the garden a few months previous. Wow, did they grow! A few times I gently re-directed the vines, as they spread across one of our walking trails.

By early September, ten big squashes had matured from green to tan and the skins were thick, indicating ripeness. Amazingly, I still had one Seminole Pumpkin left from the previous year, stored in our basement which maintains a year-round temperature of about 60°F... so it stores very well. I picked the ripe ten squashes and  continued to harvest individual pumpkins for several weeks. When a heavy frost threatened in mid October, I read that I should pick any remaining squashes and let them ripen indoors; these would not be as good for longterm storage as those which had ripened on the vines. So I picked about 10 more which still had some green skin. Not wanting to line them up in the living room, where the room temperature would be closer to the recommended 80 degrees for ripening, I placed these on my open shelves in front of the south-facing basement window. It took many weeks, but eventually these fruit did ripen, and tasted just as good as the others.

I also recommend Seminole Pumpkin because it is very nutritious, easy to cut, and the seeds roast up as a delicious snack. My raw harvested squashes cut very well with my best bread knife. You can roast, boil, microwave, and cook squashes in a variety of ways; I find it quick and easy to cook large batches in my pressure cooker, unpeeled. Once cooked and cooled, the pulp easily scoops out of the shell. To use fresh pumpkin in baking (especially in recipes calling for canned pumpkin), it is best to drain off the excess liquid from the pulp. After I mash the pumpkin in the food processor to make a smooth consistency, I either

• drain the puree in a colander lined with coffee filters and discard the liquid 
• put the puree in a container and refrigerate overnight, then pour off the liquid which separates from the pulp

This pumpkin freezes well; I measured about 3 cups of puree from each harvested squash, and stored it in zip bags which stack flat in the freezer.

If you want to grow Seminole Pumpkin, just ask me for some seeds and I'll save some I don't eat!

Also, check out these recipes which use fresh pumpkin:
Pumpkin Chai Snickerdoodles
Pumpkin Cranberry Bread
and watch for my future posts (like the yummy pumpkin cake shown here) using this nutrituous delicious vegetable!

Pumpkin Chai Snickerdoodles

The first baking lesson in my 7th grade Home Economics class with Mrs. Hamel was Snickerdoodle Cookies. This is a great variation on the classic, especially made with homegrown pumpkin. Did you know you can use butternut squash in place of canned pumpkin in recipes? When making your own, just be sure to drain the liquid off the cooked squash or pumpkin, to get that similar thick consistency to canned. More on using fresh pumpkin in a future post....

These are gluten-free, to fit my lifestyle diet, but certainly can be made with wheat flour to produce the same delicious results. 

Remember, ingredients shown in red are described in more detail on the Ingredients page of this blog.


Pumpkin Snickerdoodles with Chai Spices (makes about 15 cookies)

INGREDIENTS

• 2 c fine almond flour or (part almond and part all-purpose gluten-free flour)
• 1 t pumpkin pie spice or chai spices*
• 1/4 t salt
• 1/4 t baking soda
• 1/2 c fresh pumpkin puree, drained to make it thick
• 1/4 c melted coconut oil
• 1/4 c honey
• 1 t vanilla extract
• Optional: 1 T psyllium husk powder (makes a firmer cookie texture)

COATING:

• 2 T coconut palm sugar
• 2 tsp chai spices*

INSTRUCTIONS
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cut parchment paper to line your cookie sheet.

In a medium bowl, whisk the dry ingredients. In another bowl, mix the wet ingredients. (Make sure your pumpkin is at room temperature so the coconut oil does not harden.)

Mix the coating ingredients, sugar and spices, in a small bag.

Pour the wet mixture into the dry mix and blend by hand. The dough will be thick, so mix to moisten everything well. Form one tablespoon of dough into a ball (wet hands if necessary to prevent sticking), roughly golf ball size. Drop it into the bag of sugar and spice coating and shake to coat. Reach in and shake off excess, then place the dough ball on a cookie sheet. Flatten the ball with your fingers to about 1/2" thick. These cookies don't expand much except to puff up a bit, so you can place them close. Repeat with rest of the dough.

Bake for 20 minutes until bottoms are golden and the tops begin to crack.

* You can substitute cinnamon for chai spices. I mix my own chai spices, mimicking the traditional chai tea flavors:
4 parts ground cinnamon
1 part ground cloves
1 part ground nutmeg
1 part ground cardamon
1 part ground allspice
1 part powdered ginger root
1 part ground black pepper

The Pumpkin Tree

This photo is for those who think milk comes from a supermarket... a pumpkin tree, ready for harvest! I spotted this unusual sight at an apple farm in New England two weeks ago.

Pumpkin Cranberry Bread

Now that I've posted how to cook pumpkin, here's a delicious quick bread to make with the pulp. This recipe uses fresh cranberries, which are easy to find this time of year. Beware of dried cranberries, by the way - you won't find any that don't have added sugar, since the berry is so sour. Incidently, cooked butternut squash substitutes perfectly for pumpkin.

• 2 eggs, beaten slightly
• 1-1/2 c honey
• 1/2 c vegetable oil
• 1-1/4 c cooked, drained pumpkin
• 2-1/2 c flour
• 1 c chopped fresh cranberries
• 1 T pumpkin pie spice*
• 1 t baking soda
• 1/2 t salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, grease two loaf pans. Mix the first 4 ingredients in one bowl, and the remaining dry ingredients and cranberries in a second bowl. Add the wet to dry, mixing just to moisten thoroughly. Bake 1 hour.

* See my Ingredients in the right column for directions to mix your own Pumpkin Pie Spice

Pumpkins

The pumpkins I painted for Halloween are still looking good, so they are hanging around for a while. But if yours are ready to retire, don't just throw them away. Pumpkin seeds are delicious and nutritious, and the puree is great for eating and baking into breads and pies.

Carefully cut the pumpkin into halves or smaller, depending on its size. Use a spoon to scrape out the seeds and inner pulp. I boil the seeds in water for 5 minutes, which helps clean the strings and pulp off, then drain well. You can season the seeds, with Italian salad dressing or olive oil, and sprinkle with salt or other spices. Bake in a single layer on a cookie sheet at 250 degrees for 30 minutes, stir and bake 30-60 minutes more, until crunchy.

To bake the pumpkin pulp, line a roasting pan with foil - do not skip this step... the pumpkin is full of natural sugars which carmelize while they roast and can ruin a pan with burned-on residue (I know, I've scraped a few roasting pans!). Place pumpkin pieces cut side down. Add water to the pan to help keep from sticking. I also recommend covering tightly with foil - keeps down the splattering and slows down the evaporation of the water. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 to 2 hours, until fork-tender. Remove. When cool, scrape pulp from shells. Puree the pulp with a potato masher or in a food processor and set in a colander over a bowl to drain out extra moisture, and you'll end up with a nicer puree than what comes from a can. The puree can be used immediately or frozen in a zipper bag, in 1 cup portions for easy use later.

Incidently, you'll see some of my mums in the photo. I'll tell you more about this in another blog, but, for now, if you've bought pots of fall chrysanthemums, they can be planted for next year. When the flowers die off, just cut off the tops and plant in your garden. It is a perennial and I've had them come back year after year, even in the cold of New Hampshire. More info on this later.