We had quite a lot of trouble with our garden this year. In the first place we planted a lot of things late, and some things not at all. Then, with the cool, wet summer, things grew very slowly. There were still scads of green peppers on the plants when the frost killed them. A lot of our winter squashes were very small still when the frost came. Then, too, we had a white mold attack our squashes and melons at the end of summer, killing a number of plants and seriously stunting others. Out of my three "Fairytale" pumpkin plants, sprawling in all their pumpkin vine extravagance over a huge section of garden space, I ended up with one pumpkin. We've had trouble in the past with poor pollination of these and I need to have my act together next year and plant more pollinator attracting flowers in the garden. Or something. Take up beekeeping maybe.
Anyway, I watched that pumpkin get bigger and bigger. The frost came nearer and nearer. It was still green. The skin got darker green after a while, but never turned the deep brown-orange I was waiting for. I had prayed for that pumpkin a lot. I bought a little pie pumpkin when I needed to make spicy pumpkin soup for a party. I kept telling myself I needed to stop at a particular store this week and buy a couple more pie pumpkins because the one was so good.
I got my honey to bring the big, heavy green pumpkin inside. I thought I'd at least try making a mock apple pie with some of it. Nate cut it open for me. Imagine my surprise to see this:
And it smelled delicious too! One of the things I love about this particular pumpkin is that it smells like melon. I'm not a fan of the squashy winter squash smell:) We cooked up some of it and it tasted great. So, I spent two days cooking and pureeing pumpkin. I've got quarts and quarts of it in the freezer! So, hurray for pumpkin pies, and cupcakes and bars and soup and whatever else we come up with.
I also discovered, by trying it, that pumpkin works great as a substitute for the ketchup or tomato sauce in meatloaf, yum:)
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