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Don’t waste it! How to make use of your Hallowe’en pumpkin

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Want to make good use of that pumpkin flesh carved out of your kids’ Hallowe’en lantern?

This recipe for pumpkin soup is easy, quick and entirely veggie. And you don’t have to use it only at Hallowe’en.

Preparation time: less than 30min
Cooking time: 30min to 1hr
Serves: 6–8

What you’ll need…
2 large onions, chopped
3 carrots, peeled and chopped
2 garlic cloves
2 bay leaf
1oz-2oz unsalted butter
3 tbsp olive oil
1 medium pumpkin (prepared weight about 2lb) deseeded and roughly chopped
1 medium-sized potato, roughly chopped
1¾ pint vegetable stock, a little extra may be needed
3½fl oz double cream
3 tbsp pumpkin seeds
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Put the onion, carrots, garlic bay leaf, butter and half the olive oil into a large pan. Cook over a low–medium heat for about 10 minutes until the vegetables are tender but not coloured.

Add the pumpkin and potato, mix to combine and cook for a further 2–3 minutes. Pour in the stock, season well and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat to a gentle simmer, half cover the pan with a lid and continue to cook for about 40 minutes until the pumpkin is soft right through when tested with the point of a knife.

Pick out the bay leaf and blend the soup until smooth using a stick blender.

Add the cream and a little more stock if the soup is on the thick side, taste for seasoning, adding more salt and pepper as required.

Meanwhile, heat the remaining oil in a frying pan over a medium heat and add the pumpkin seeds and fry quickly until the seeds start to pop. Remove from the pan.

Ladle the soup into bowls and serve with a swirl of cream and the toasted pumpkin seeds.

Remember… Pumpkins vary considerably in flavour and sweetness. A large pumpkin will almost always have more water and less flavour than a smaller pumpkin.

You can also make this hearty winter soup with roast butternut squash, reducing the simmering time to 15 minutes, just so the potato is cooked through.

Read more: 12.6 million pumpkins heading for landfill this weekend


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