Work and school, school and work—that’s pretty much all I am doing these days. I have been cooking, but I haven’t been doing a lot of writing about what I’ve been cooking (I have been writing Python programs and HTML code, so I have that going for me). Even though there has been a lot going on outside of the kitchen, I did get one of the “I have always wanted to make that” items crossed off of my list: pumpkin pie made from a for real pumpkin.
I say I am going to make this pie for Thanksgiving every year, and every year when Thanksgiving rolls around, I can’t find sugar pumpkins at my grocery store. They are plentiful in the weeks before Halloween, but they disappear shortly after. This year, I bought early.
Sugar pumpkins (or pie pumpkins) are smaller than traditional Jack-o-Lantern pumpkin. The pumpkin prep was surprisingly easy, though scrapping the seeds out of a pumpkin can be a little messy. I really like the spice mixture used in this pie—I think it is a bit spicier than my usual recipe (back of the Libby’s can). Using the recipe below, I was able to fill a 9-inch deep-dish pie shell plus two ramekins that baked alongside the pie. My pie baked almost 20 minutes longer than the time listed in the recipe. I’ve left the original baking time in the recipe below; just know that your pie may need to bake longer.
This recipe is adapted from PickYouOwn.org.
What You Need
- 1 unbaked 9-inch deep-dish pie shell
- 1 sugar (or pie) pumpkin
- 1 c sugar
- 1 1/2 t ground cinnamon
- 1 t ground cloves
- 1 t ground allspice
- 1/2 t ground ginger
- 1/2 t vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 4 large eggs
- 18 oz evaporated milk (I had leftover heavy cream in the fridge, so I used that instead. The original recipe says that milk will work, too)
What You Do
Rinse the pumpkin with water and dry. Using a serrated knife, cut off the stem, then cut the pumpkin in half. Scoop out the seeds and the pumpkin “guts” with an ice cream scoop. You want to get rid of the stringy innards.
There are several methods for cooking the pumpkin on the pumpkin pie page of PickYouOwn.org. I steamed mine. Place a steamer basket over a large pot of boiling water and cover. Steam the pumpkin until it is very tender, 20 to 30 minutes. Let the pumpkin cool a bit so it is easier to handle.
Scoop the cooked flesh off of the pumpkin skin with a spoon. The flesh should easily separate from the skin—if it doesn’t separate smoothly, the pumpkin probably needs to cook a bit longer.
Place the pumpkin flesh in the bowl of a food processor and process until the pumpkin in very smooth. You could also use an immersion blender or regular blender for this. You should have about 3 cups of pumpkin puree.
Heat oven to 425°.
In a small dish, beat the eggs. In a large bowl, place the pumpkin puree, sugar, cinnamon, cloves, allspice, ginger, vanilla, salt, beaten eggs, and evaporate milk. Mix well. The mixture will be quite runny.
Fill the pie shell with the filling. Bake at 425° for 15 minutes. Reduce the temperature to 350° and bake an additional 45 to 60 minutes (my pie needed closer to 80 minutes). The pie is done when a knife inserted into the center of the pie comes out clean. Let the pie cool. Serve at room temperature or chilled.
This is great! I never knew making your own pumpkin purée was so easy (although it’s pretty obvious now after reading you post). Have you tried it with other pumpkins? I have a giant cheese pumpkin sitting on my counter…
I have only tried it with the pie pumpkin, but the PickYourOwn site says:
“In some parts of the country, they are also called sugar pumpkins or even ‘cheese pumpkins’.”
So, you could probably use the same steps. If the pumpkin is really big, you’ll probably be making a lot of pies (woo-hoo!) or you will need to freeze some of the puree. I have some in my freezer now, but I probably won’t use it until Thanksgiving next week, so I can’t tell you how well that works just yet.
There are also instructions on the site for making pie from a jack-o-lantern pumpkin. They don’t look much different at a glance, but here’s the address:
http://www.pickyourown.org/pumpkinpiejackolantern.php