How to Make a Pumpkin Pie from a Real Pumpkin

You may feel like you're inundated with pumpkins around Halloween time, but sometimes the day you're looking to find one, you can't! You may go into your local grocery store, stare at a display of nuts and Christmas candies and say "They were right there a week ago!" But never fear.

You may still be able to get your hands on a fresh pumpkin later in the season. Some great places to try are local farm stands or farmers' markets. It's always a good idea to buy from local farmers because you're getting high quality produce as well as supporting the livelihood of small, family-run farms. Doesn't that make you feel good?

This handy website actually offers a tool where you can type in your state or zip code and find out where all of the local pumpkin patches/stands that carry pumpkins are.

I've found when baking that this cookbook I have called The Best of Amish Cooking
offers some really wonderful, flavorful, natural recipes. Their carrot cake recipe is so good, and I don't even usually like carrot cake!

But this lens isn't about carrot cake, this is about pumpkin pie. The recipes in this book really feel like comfort foods with their simple ingredients and methods for cooking. It turns out that pumpkin pie when prepared by the Amish is rarely associated with Thanksgiving or Christmas, and is just a staple dish that is prepared for any occasion. I could live with that.

Since the recipe is likely copyrighted, unfortunately I can't post it here. But I did find another recipe that I've used multiple times and it is AWESOME. The honey instead of white sugar really adds some nice flavor.
courtesy of allrecipes.com. (the original recipe link can be found here).

Awesome Pumpkin Pie Recipe That I Use
"Pumpkin Pie using fresh garden pumpkins. Best served barely warm, with freshly whipped cream on top of each serving. Use the remaining pumpkin puree in any recipe that calls for canned pumpkin."

Ingredients
* 1 medium sugar pumpkin
* 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
* 1 recipe pastry for a 9 inch single crust pie
* 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
* 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 4 eggs, lightly beaten
* 1 cup honey, warmed slightly
* 1/2 cup milk
* 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream

Directions
Cut pumpkin in half, and remove seeds. Lightly oil the cut surface. Place cut side down on a jelly roll pan lined with foil and lightly oiled. Bake at 325 degrees F (165 degrees C) until the flesh is tender when poked with a fork. Cool until just warm. Scrape the pumpkin flesh from the peel. Either mash, or puree in small batches in a blender.

In large bowl, blend together 2 cups pumpkin puree, spices, and salt. Beat in eggs, honey, milk, and cream. Pour filling into pie shell.

Bake at 400 degrees F ( 205 degrees C) for 50 to 55 minutes, or until a knife inserted 1 inch from edge of pie comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack.

As with any recipe, you can make it your own with an adjustment to spices and other ingredients. I've found that reducing the amount of honey to 3/4 or so allows the pumpkin flavor to come out more in this recipe, and also makes it less sweet, so if you add whipped cream, you're not overwhelmed. Also, if you find that your pumpkin is somewhat watery, adding less milk/cream will solve that problem.

** FRESH PUMPKIN TIP ** Sometimes I find that fresh pumpkin, once prepared and pureed, can be a little watery. Wrapping cooked pumpkin in cheesecloth will help squeeze out the moisture. If you don't have cheesecloth (I don't, sadly), sometimes just taking a wad of paper towels and pressing into your pumpkin mixture can help. I've gone through a lot of them before and it feels kind of wasteful, though. So cheesecloth is definitely the way to go if you have some.

With pumpkin pies, as with many things in life, sometimes the extra time and effort really makes it worth it. You may find that you're so used to the canned pumpkin flavor, you might be scared to try fresh pumpkin pie, but trust me, it's worth it! You'll actually be able to taste the pumpkin without feeling like you're eating veggies. It just has that much more of a natural, delicious flavor that you just can't achieve through canned pumpkin preserves.

When buying a pumpkin, try to find "sugar pumpkins" instead of the huge jack-o-lantern kind. It will just be more fibrous the bigger it is, but they're all a tasty alternative to canned pumpkin preserves.

No wonder pumpkin pie makes us think of Thanksgiving! Some early variations of pumpkin pie were reported right around the time of the settlers at Plimoth Plantation in the early 1620s.

By 1670, a version of a pumpkin torte became known as "Pompion Pie" was making its mark in England, which involved fried pumpkin slices with eggs and herbs, butter, raisins, currans, and sugar layered over tart apples in a pie. Sounds pretty good to me! (though I'm not a huge fan of raisins.)

It wouldn't be until over a century later in 1796 when an American cookbook was published containing a recipe most closely resembling the pumpkin pie that we know and love today, with a spiced pumpkin custard baked in a crust.

Many thanks to Linda Stradley ofa>