Pumpkin Power
Posted in Gardening Tips on October 22 2013, by Sonia Uyterhoeven
Sonia Uyterhoeven is the NYBG‘s Gardener for Public Education.
This is the time of year when we celebrate everything autumnal at the Garden. As part of the Haunted Pumpkin Garden, some of the year’s biggest pumpkins have been carved by master carver Ray Villafane and his crew from Villafane Studios into a display with a theme resembling a home garden run amok. I am personally hoping to see Rick Moranis pop out of one of these pumpkins and wow us with his endearing humor, but something tells me that won’t happen. In addition, we have a lot of fun activities going on at the Garden right now, from demonstrations with bats and bugs to the statuesque and enthralling Japanese chrysanthemum exhibition, Kiku: The Art of the Japanese Garden.
In the spirit of the season, I’ll be in the Perennial Garden this weekend giving a demonstration on how to make decorative arrangements with pumpkins and gourds. This demonstration is always a popular one, giving homeowners some fun, easy, and creative ideas on how to dress up their homes for the holidays.
When you’re carving pumpkins at home, do not forget to save the seeds for making roasted pumpkin seeds—not only are they salty, crunchy, and delicious, but they are also fun to prepare.
The easiest way to carve a pumpkin is to stand over it looking downward. Hold the stem firmly and cut around its base, giving yourself a big enough hole in the top of the pumpkin to stick your hand inside. I usually cut at a slight angle and make a pentagon shape, jabbing the knife in five times to create a lid. The inward angle ensures that this lid won’t fall in when you place it back on the pumpkin later.
I then take a large metal spoon and scoop out the ‘goop’—the seeds and pulp. If you are going to use the pumpkin for arrangements or create a Jack-o’-lantern, it is important to give the insides a good cleaning to avoid smell later. I scrape the insides until I am down to the flesh, leaving the inner walls of the pumpkin smooth and clean.
With the pumpkin cleaned, sort out the seeds and place them in a colander, rinsing under cold water to remove all of the pulp. Once the seeds are rinsed, place them on a paper towel and pat them until they are just slightly dry. The recipes that you will find for roasting pumpkin seeds will vary when it comes to oven temperature, ranging from 275°F to 350°F. Roasting time adjusts accordingly, with recipes in the higher temperature range recommending a 20 to 25 minute roasting time and recipes in the low range suggesting one hour. For the middle range, around 300°F, roast for 40 to 45 minutes.
What you do from this point depends on your personal preference. The basic recipe is to melt 1 1/2 tablespoons of butter or margarine with a 1/2 teaspoon of salt. Combine approximately 1 1/2 to 2 cups of seeds in the buttery mix and spread them onto a shallow baking dish.
Variations include adding Worcestershire sauce, a pinch of garlic salt, cinnamon, sugar, cayenne pepper (1/4 teaspoon), chili powder, cumin, or whatever suits your fancy–not all of the above in one batch, of course, as that would be a culinary disaster. There are recipes for spicy and for sweet, for simple and complex, savory flavors, and whatever else you can think of. When coating the seeds with sugar and spices, it is often best to roast them in the oven first and then place the roasted seeds in a frying pan with a little oil–add sugar and stir until melted (this takes a few minutes) before tossing the seeds in the spice mix and stirring to evenly coat.
If you are wondering what to do with your pumpkin after it is all scooped out, come by the Garden next weekend for my 2 p.m. demonstration to see how to make fabulous floral decorations, or go to the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden to pick up Jack-o’-lantern tips and see what our visiting professionals do with the giant curcurbits that are here for Halloween. And if none of that appeals, well, you can always stay home and bake a pumpkin pie. Enjoy this beautiful fall!
