Pumpkin Soup

I have never in my life tasted pumpkin. I know, I know, as a half-American that's a shocking confession. As a child I had never even seen a pumpkin, not even at Hallowe'en. I don't remember any fuss about Hallowe'en in rural Norfolk in the 1970s. In fact, I think I first heard about it all via Charlie Brown books and tv - definitely an American thing!

Anyway, this year I bought some cute mini-pumpkins, called Munchkin Pumpkins, for display along with the large carved one. It seemed a shame to just put them in the compost bin so, after first making sure they were edible, I looked on the internet for a really easy pumpkin soup recipe. This is the one I found, from the BBC Good Food site. All you need is pumpkins, onions,  vegetable stock, double cream and seasoning.

So, first you peel, de-seed and chop the pumpkins.

The peeling was a bit tricky - maybe it would have been easier if the pumpkins had been fresher?

Next, chop the onions.

Gently fry the onions till softened but not coloured.

Add the pumpkin pieces and cook till starts to soften.

Pour in the vegetable stock (I used Oxo), season and bring to boil. Simmer for about 10 mins till pumpkin very soft.

Add the double cream and bring back to boil.

Now use a blender to puree. I love my hand cranked one!

Ta da! Delicious soup!

So simple and soooooooooo tasty.

On reflection I think next time I would do the pureeing before adding the cream, since it was too liquidy at that point. (What I actually did was strain off the excess liquid, puree the rest, then add the liquid again.)

I'm sure lots of you have your own pumpkin recipes to tell me about!