Halloween horror: a shortage of pumpkins!

It’s hard to believe there’s a nationwide shortage of edible pumpkins. Just drive around the Tri-state area; it seems like every roadside stand and farm market has loads of pumpkins for carving and for cooking. The prices don’t seem to be unusually high, either.

Reports of a pumpkin shortage seem to be coming from Nestle, which apparently supplies 80 percent of the canned pumpkin used in American cooking, most notably for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners. The company, according to news reports, grows all its pumpkins in Morton, Ill., and bad weather there this year ruined much of the crop. There will apparently be plenty of canned pumpkin for Thanksgiving but maybe not enough for Christmas.

Well, excuse me, but that’s just silly. First of all, it’s canned, so probably the pumpkin you bought and didn’t use last year is still fine. Apparently there is no “sell by” or “use by” date on canned pumpkin (which should tell you something right there; even pasta has a “sell by” date on it). The website www.eatbydate.com promises that an unopened can of pumpkin should last for two to three years.

Buy local; here’s why

Let’s stop for a moment, though, and discuss the importance of eating locally grown foods. We have news media all over America warning that there won’t be enough pumpkin left for Christmas pies because one grower in one town in Illinois had bad weather. 

That is a case study in why we shouldn’t be dependent on one grower in one town in a state that’s hundreds of miles away for a food that we consider essential to our holiday happiness  — especially since it’s a fruit that’s pretty easy to grow and doesn’t require extraordinary soil or a special climate. As anyone knows who’s attended a county fair around here, growing pumpkins is literally child’s play.

There are lots and lots of different kinds of pumpkins (and gourds and squash, but for the purposes of this conversation let’s call anything a pumpkin that’s got orange flesh and is kind of round and ridged and has a woody stem).

They’re not expensive, especially at this time of year as farm markets are trying to clear their shelves in preparation for shutting down for the winter. 

They are easy to cook (Yes! They are!). And when you cook your own pumpkin, you get to roast and eat the seeds.

Carve or cook?

In case you’re confused about which ones you cook and which you carve, the large, ridged orange pumpkins that we use for jack-o’-lanterns are not great for pies or other culinary uses. Their flesh is stringy and flavorless. 

Many people say that the smaller version of this orange pumpkin (often called a sugar or pie pumpkin) can be used for pie. I disagree. 

The best pumpkins for cooking, in my opinion, look nothing like the bright orange jack-o’-lanterns. Maybe this is taking a liberty with the definition of what counts as a pumpkin but … I think the best cooking pumpkins are the flatter, beige ones that are sometimes called cheese pumpkins; and the gorgeous deep red-orange ones that are sometimes called Cinderella pumpkins and sometimes Rouge vif d’Etampes.  

I also bought some kind of pumpkin at Paley’s Farm Market that is beige and mottled with green patches; it has flatter ridges than the other pumpkins. I have no idea what it’s called, and Paley’s is closed for the season. But Charlie Paley recommended it to me as good eating, and boy was he right. The flesh is rich, and creamy and sweet. It will make an excellent pie, and in the meantime I’ve been eating it roasted and in soups. 

Variety adds flavor, nutrition

I like to mix together multiple types of squash for my soups and pies. Often I’ll add in some roasted sweet potato and some butternut squash. Each of these adds something to the flavor and each has its own nutritional benefits. (And unfortunately, there seems to be a shortage this year of sweet potatoes as well.)

All squash and orange/yellow fruit have lots of vitamin A, or beta carotene, which is good for your eyes and your hair and skin, and which also strengthens your immune system (sweet potatoes also have tons of vitamin C). 

They all have lots of potassium and magnesium, which I love because they keep my leg muscles from cramping up at night. 

Pumpkins are pretty much the equal of sweet potatoes on most nutritional levels, but they are much lower in calories and sugar than sweet potatoes (which aren’t really potatoes; we can talk about that another time). 

Pumpkins and sweet potatoes both have lots of fiber, and they’re both low in sodium.

Sweet potatoes are a little easier to manage. You can just toss them in a 375 oven and you should have a sticky nutritious and delicious snack in about a half hour (if it takes longer than that to cook, your sweets are probably really old; you might want to toss them).

It’s easy. Really, it is.

Cooking pumpkins is easy. 

Cutting pumpkins, on the other hand, can be tricky. You’ll need a sharp, heavy knife and a surface that isn’t going to let your wet pumpkin slide around too much (a heavy wood cutting board is good). 

Just plunge that knife in and then patiently work it around until you’ve cut your pumpkin in half.

That’s the hardest part. Everything else is easy. 

Once your pumpkin is in two parts you can scoop out the seeds (or leave them in if you want, but then you won’t be able to roast them). 

Line a baking dish with aluminum foil; pumpkins give off cups and cups worth of sugary water when you bake them so be sure it’s a baking dish that’s at least a half inch deep. 

Preheat the oven to 375 and then put the pumpkin in and leave it there until you can easily poke a knife through the flesh (probably about 20 minutes, although it will vary). 

Take it out and let it cool. Then you can very easily peel the shell away from the nice soft orange pulp. 

If you didn’t take out the seeds before, scoop them out now and throw them away. 

You can freeze the flesh, or use it right away for a butternut/sweet potato/pumpkin bisque or pie. I recommend you run it through a food processor first, so it isn’t stringy.

You can eat the shell 

I recently discovered another, really sublime way to cook pumpkin. First, cut your pumpkin in half and scoop out the seeds. Then carefully cut the two halves into quarter-inch slices. Get a large saucepan full of water boiling and drop the pumpkin slices in (don’t put in so many at one time that the water stops boiling). 

Let them cook until they’re soft. Then you can roast them quickly with any flavoring you like. The flavor and texture are sublime. 

Last week, for dessert, I put my parboiled pumpkin slices on a parchment-paper-lined baking sheet and drizzled simple syrup over them (boil equal parts water and sugar until the sugar dissolves).

I let the syrup soak into the pumpkin slices during dinner, then preheated the oven to 375 degrees. I roasted the pumpkin slices for about 10 minutes, until they began to blister deliciously from the heat and the sugar.  

When they came out of the oven, they were sticky and creamy and gorgeous. You can even eat the pumpkin shell, which had become crisp and tasty, like the dessert version of crispy chicken skin.