Sweet and Spicy Pumpkin Soup

Blogging Marathon# 58: Week 4/ Day 1

Theme: Bookmarked Dishes

Dish: Sweet and Spicy Pumpkin Soup

We are in the last week of this month's blogging marathon and my theme for this week is 'Bookmarked Recipes'. I always jump on the chance of getting some of my bookmarks cleared and this theme is just perfect.

We are 2 days away from 'Thanksgiving', which means that holiday season is right here and I'm sure many of you are planning on sending/ shipping gifts to your loved ones. I just found out about a really good shipping option for all your international and domestic packages -- Transworthy. Few points that make it better than the other international shipping options are:

• 74% savings on your shipping costs.
• NO waiting in lines to send the package, they pick up the package right from your home or office.
• Shipment can be tracked on the DHL site.
• Convenient payment on their site.

So take a minute to explore more about Transworthy and see if it is a good fit for your shipping this holiday season. Here's a list to my edible holiday gift guide to help you out with what to send :-)

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Homemade Roasted Pumpkin Puree Recipe

I wanted to post this homemade roasted pumpkin puree recipe for a while now. I ended up with 5 small pumpkins in the house and after using them for decoration and moving them from room to room (thinking that if I don't see them, they will vanish magically), I finally decided to get off my bottom to make something before they go bad.

This basic pumpkin puree recipe is from 'The Pumpkin Spice Handbook' (my photo is published in this book). The pumpkins I had probably weighed about 3~4 lbs, so I roasted 2 pumpkins in 2 batches.

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Pumpkin Dinner Rolls for #BreadBakers

November is cruising by and with the festival season around, I'm sure all of you must be planning or at least thinking of your holiday menus. So you are in luck because our #BreadBakers group is baking up some special and festive loaves or rolls or breads that you can bring to a family feast or celebratory dinner. Actually I'm lucky to be hosting this month's event, big thanks to Stacy and Renee for the opportunity. Don't forget to scroll down to the bottom of the post for the list of breads by my fellow bread bakers.

We went apple picking last month and ended up with 4 little pie pumpkins from the patch. I kept them for display till Halloween, then roasted a couple and made pumpkin puree out of them. With that puree I made these Pumpkin dinner rolls. Recipe is from King Arthur Flour site.

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Pumpkin Ice Cream (Eggless Recipe)

I don't want to say it loud but it has been a mild fall so far. Temperatures have been warmer than usual and we are occasionally still sporting our summer sandals and half sleeves. But the daylight hours have started to get shorter and the trees are changing into beautiful shades of red, yellow and gold.

This pumpkin ice cream is perfect for this time of the year. Fall flavors with not so fall weather calls for an dessert like this. I tasted my first pumpkin flavored ice cream on one of my recent farm visit with few of my blog buddies. It was a pumpkin-vanilla soft swirl and I loved it. Also my son randomly asked for pumpkin ice cream recently, so I've been looking for a recipe.

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Pumpkin Raisin Bagels for #BreadBakers

It's time for this month's #BreadBakers event and the theme is very apt for this time of the year, 'Hearty Fall Breads'. Our host for the month is Wendy who blogs at 'A Day in the life on the farm'. She asked us what reminds us of fall and I immediately thought of Pumpkin and then made these 'Pumpkin-Raisin Bagels'.

Talking of pumpkins, my pumpkin milk shake post from last year got published in 'The Pumpkin Spice' handbook. I was so excited to see the glossy full size picture of the milkshake in an actual book. Publishers were kind enough to send a complementary copy and it is filled with nothing but pumpkin recipes.

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Pumpkin Rice for Thanksgiving (Arroz con Calabaza -- Vegan Recipe)

Blogging Marthon# 46: Week 1/ Day 1
Theme: Festival Special -- Thanksgiving
Dish: Pumpkin Rice/ Arroz con Calabaza

We are starting a new edition of Blogging Marathon today and my theme for this week is 'Festival Special. Since it's November and we are only few weeks away from Thanksgiving, I decided to make some easy Vegetarian dishes for the occasion.

Thanksgiving Day is a national holiday that is celebrated on the fourth Thursday in the United States. It is the day of giving thanks for the blessing of the harvest and of the preceding year. The holiday's history in North America is rooted in English traditions -- it has aspects of harvest festival almost similar to that of Pongal in South India. 

For the very first Thanksgiving in the US, the Dean of our Department invited few of us poor graduate students who didn't have anywhere to go. There was so much food and that was the first turkey I saw in my life (dead that is...) Thankfully they had lot of vegetarian food too that I was able to enjoy.

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Pumpkin Smoothie & My 5 Fall/ Autumn Favorites

It's officially Fall here (September 22) and the weather is slowly getting chilly and crisp. I see the trees changing color and perhaps that is the best part of fall that I love -- all the beautiful colors. Fall also means kids going back to school, days getting shorter and days getting busier. Busy means less time to go shopping even for ingredients and favorite foods and I find myself doing a lot of online shopping these days. I didn't realize until recently that I can buy gift cards for just about any store like Walmart or Target or Whole Foods at a discounted price on Raise.com.
Raise is the first online marketplace to buy and sell gift cards, where you can buy discount gift cards to your favorite stores or sell your unwanted gift cards for cash. Their marketplace has a wide variety of brands; from Starbucks to Target and many many more. Buying a gift card to a specific store is a great idea, so the recipient can buy what they want instead of getting gifts that they don't really want/ need.
I wanted to share my 5 Fall/ Autumn food favorites and I'm sure I'll be using Raise to buy some gift cards to get my ingredients for the recipes.

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Adai Aviyal

Blogging Marathon# 35: Week 4/ Day 1
Theme: Bookmarked recipes
Dish: Adai Aviyal

We are starting the final week of Blogging Marathon today and my theme for this week is 'Bookmarked recipes'. My bookmarks are multiplying by the minute. There are so many recipes that I really really want to try but I never seem to find the time or the occasion to make them. Thanks to Valli for creating the occasion by making bookmarked recipes as a theme during BM, which gives us a chance to try at least 3 dishes from the bookmarked folder.

So for the first day, I made Adai-Aviyal (Avial). I didn't know they were served together as a combo until BM# 30 where this was part of the combo dishes. Few of my fellow marathoners made this combo and I bookmarked Vaishali's & Priya's posts.

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Individual Pumpkin Pies in Baby Food Jars

I'm currently obsessed with desserts made in baby food jars. I have been collecting my daughter's baby food jars and using them to serve individual desserts at parties. Idea actually came after seeing these cute little mango pannacottas that Sia @ Monsoon Spice served for her son's birthday. I fell in love with her clicks and the idea of reusing baby food jars and started to store them instead of recycling them.

I made individual cheesecake parfaits for my daughter's first birthday. They were instant hit at the party. Unfortunately I couldn't take pictures of them. Will definitely plan to make them soon and post it here for my own future reference.

I made these individual pumpkin pies for Thanksgiving party. This is more like a parfait with the flavors of pumpkin pie -- crispy graham cracker layer, sweet pumpkin pudding layer, crunchy candy/ toffee layer, creamy cinnamon-whipped cream layer. 

After making this pumpkin tiramisu which had a homemade cake layer along with the pumpkin pudding layer, I wanted to make something that was quick and easy to make. I also wanted to add different textures to the parfait which is why I added some crunchy, sweet candy bits as a layer.

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Kerala Cabbage Thoran & Sambar

Blogging Marathon# 35: Day 1/ Week 2
Theme: Regional Dishes - Course Specific
Dish: Kerala Cabbage Thoran & Sambar

We are starting our Week 2 of Blogging Marathon# 35 and my theme for this week is 'Any Regional with Course Specific dishes'. After seeing Rajani's Kerala Sadya recipes during the mega month long marathon, I have been planning to try my hand at Kerala dishes. Finally I made 3 dishes for this week's marathon.
The twist that Valli put to this seemingly simple theme is that we have to post a different course every day. So for the first day I'm posting 2 Kerala Lunch dishes, a simple Cabbage thoran and a hearty Sambar.

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Pumpkin Cake Muffins (Eggless Recipe)

I wanted to use up some of the pumpkin puree I had left after making a dessert for Thanksgiving (recipe for Individual no-bake pumpkin pie coming up soon).  I browsed through Pinterest board and found these delicious Pumpkin Cake doughnuts recipe from King Arthur Flour.

I don't have a standard size doughnut pan, so I made them into muffins instead. Also since I only had 1cup of pumpkin puree left, I adjusted the quantitiesof the ingredients accordingly. Original recipe had 3 eggs and with my downsizing the recipe I had to use 2 which I comfortably substituted with egg replacer powder. 

I found the muffins to be a little too sweet to my liking. I think the next time I make it I will reduce the sugar quantity by ¼cup. I should have smoothed the tops of the muffins before baking, they turned out a little rustic looking :-)

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Pumpkin Tiramisu (Eggless Recipe)

Blogging Marathon# 34: Week 3/ Day 2
Theme: Desserts with Vegetables
Dish: Pumpkin Tiramisu

If you are still thinking of what to make for Thanksgiving dessert, then here is a perfect recipe for you. I made this couple of weeks ago for our (very) early Thanksgiving party. After that party I realized that we don't really have to wait for Thanksgiving to give thanks to people we love and care about, it can be and should be done any time.

I was asked to bring a dessert and I thought something with pumpkin will be appropriate. I found a recipe for Pumpkin Tiramisu on Martha Stewart's site and I planned to make it. Recipe used uncooked pumpkin puree for layering with the lady fingers. I wasn't sure if it would be too pumpkiny, so I scratched that recipe. Then I found vegan chef Chloe Coscarelli's Vegan Pumpkin Tiramisu and after reading through the mostly positive reviews, I made it for the party.

This dessert is a little time consuming to make, but it totally worth the effort. Pumpkin crème layer can be made at least 2 days ahead and kept in the refrigerator until ready to use. Once the cakes are baked and the trifle is made, it needs to be refrigerated for at least 3~4 hours or overnight to set. The original recipe uses whipped coconut cream to make it completely vegan, but I used regular whipping cream since I never whipped coconut milk and didn't want to take try my luck at this party.

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Erra Gummadikaya Pulusu (Andhra style Pumpkin Stew)

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter E
Theme: A-Z Vegetarian Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: E for Erra Gummadikaya Pulusu (Andhra Style Pumpkin Stew)

I thought E to be one of the hardest letters to find dishes for. I found the recipe with Erra Gummadikaya aka pumpkin aka thiyya gummadikaya in 'Cooking with Pedatha' cookbook. This is a very hearty stew with a variety of veggies and can easily feed a crowd.

I used pumpkin (erra gumamdikaya), eggplant (vankaya) and potato, but other veggies like bottle goud, drumsticks, sweet potato are also typically used in this preparation.

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Pumpkin Milkshake

Blogging Marathon# 27: Week 3/ Day 6
Theme: Seasonal Dishes - Fall Dessert
Dish: Pumpkin Milkshake

It has been a very busy weekend, so this is going to be a short post. Fall brings Halloween, Jack o Lanterns ,  pumpkins and apples. I had actually planned on making a proper fall dessert like apple bread pudding or apple crostata or pumpkin cheesecake. But after meyer lemon cake and coconut ice cream, I thought it is best to make something light and something I don't have to eat out of the refrigerator for too long.

I never bought a whole pumpkin, but I always keep canned pumpkin puree in the pantry. Here's a quick and easy milkshake to enjoy fall.

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White Pumpkin & Swiss Chard Curry

White pumpkin (Gummadikaya in Telugu) is a very versatile veggie and can be used to make dals, curries and stews. This time around I had a bunch of Swiss Chard that needed to be used up, so I added it to the curry to boost the nutrition. To make the curry creamy and not make it too dry, I added coconut cream, the top layer in unshaken canned coconut milk. All in all the curry turned out to be quite tasty.

Here’s how I made it:
Ingredients:
White Pumpkin – 3 cups, diced into 1” cubes (Zucchini should be a good substitute)
Swiss Chard – 1 small bunch, chopped
Chana dal – ½ cup, soaked in water for at least 30 minutes
Green chilies – 3, sliced
Coconut cream – 1tsbp, just skim the thick cream that forms on the top of regular coconut milk can
Turmeric – 1/8 tsp

For tempering:

Mustard Seeds – 1tsp

Cumin seeds – 1tsp

Dry red chilies – 3

Method:

• Microwave pumpkin with ½ cup water until tender.
• Heat 2tsp oil in a sauté pan; add the tempering ingredients and once they splutter add green chilies, soaked chana and cooked pumpkin with any leftover water after microwaving.
• Mix well and add the chopped chard. Cover and cook till chard is wilted and the dal is completely cooked.
• Add coconut cream and salt, simmer for another 2 minutes.

Serve with steamed rice or roti.

White Pumpkin in Tamarind Gravy (Gummadikaya Pulusu Kura)

Vegan Mofo Day 10:

White Pumpkin aka Ash Gourd in India is a very versatile vegetable (wow.. alliteration right there). You can make both sweet and savory dishes with it. My mom makes halwa with it, but I’ve never tried it myself. I usually make aviyal or this curry with it. But this time wanted to try something slightly tangy and sweet with it. Curry tastes even better the next day.

Ingredients:

Ash Gourd/ White Pumpkin/ Gummadikaya – 1 small piece, 3-4 cups when chopped
Onion – 1 medium, chopped
Green chilies – 2, slit
Tomato Paste – 2tbsp
Sambar powder – 1tsp (I use MTR brand)
Tamarind paste - 2tbsp (Thanks Anise for pointing this out)

Turmeric – ¼ tsp
Jaggery/ Brown sugar – 2tsp
Roasted peanuts – 2tbsp, coarsely ground
Sesame seeds – 2tsp, dry roasted and ground to powder
Salt – to taste

For tempering:
Urad dal (Minapappu) – 1tsp
Chana dal (Senagapappu) – 1tsp
Cumin seeds – 1tsp
Mustard seeds – 1tsp
Dry Red chilies – 1-2
Curry leaves – 6-8

Method:

• Microwave the chopped pumpkin with ½ cup of water & pinch of turmeric until ¾th cooked but not completely cooked, about 5-6 minutes.
• In a sauté pan, heat 2tbsp oil; add the tempering ingredients and once the seeds start to splutter, add onions and green chilies.
• Sauté until onions turn translucent.
• Add tomato paste, sambar powder, turmeric and ½ cup of water. Cook on medium-low flame until almost all the water evaporates.
• Add the cooked pumpkin along with the water; cover and cook until the veggie is completely cooked through.
• Add tamarind paste and jaggery and more water if the curry looks too dry. Cook for another 5 minutes.
• Stir in ground peanut & sesame seeds, mix well and simmer for 5 more minutes for all the flavors to meld.

Serve with steamed rice and plain dal or with rotis.

Pumpkin (& Banana) Bread

Recipe Marathon: Day 4

After half baking my first pumpkin bread and making this yummy bread pudding I wanted to try it again this weekend. I realized I didn’t have enough pumpkin puree and my ever resourceful husband suggested adding mashed banana along with pumpkin and it turned out pretty good. This is quite spicy bread (not hot spicy.. but spice spicy), from my previous experience I used only half of the ground cloves.

Recipe is from Wholegrains Baking by King Arthur Flour.
Ingredients:
White Whole wheat Flour – 2 cups
Baking powder – ½tsp
Baking Soda – 1tsp
Salt – ½tsp
Ground cinnamon – ½tsp
Ground Cloves – ½tsp (I used only ¼tsp)
Ground nutmeg – ¼tsp
Eggs – 3 large
Butter – ½cup (1 stick) at room temperature
Light brown sugar – 1cup
Granulated sugar – ¼ cup
Pumpkin puree – 1 cup (I had about 2/3 cup, I used a ripe banana for rest of pumpkin)
Vanilla extract – 1tsp

Chopped nuts – ¾ cup (I used walnuts) Raisins, Cranberries or chocolate chips – ¾ cup (I added raisins)

Method:

• Preheat oven to 350ºF. Grease a 9”x5” loaf pan.
  
• Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices in a medium mixing bowl.
  
• In a large mixing bowl, cream butter and sugars together until light and fluffy.
  
• Add one egg at a time and mix until well incorporated. Add vanilla and pumpkin puree; mix thoroughly. Next add the flour mixture and mix until combined; make sure to scrape the bowl. Add the nuts & raisins and mix till well distributed.
  
• Pour into prepared pan; bake for an hour or until a toothpick inserted into the CENTER comes out clean.
  

I baked for about 63-65 minutes, the bread was baked perfectly around the edges but there was a little spot in the middle that took longer to bake. I was persistent this time and poked into the cake in different spots to make sure that it is baked. This makes for a great breakfast or a filling afternoon snack.

Pumpkin Bread Pudding

Recipe Marathon - Day 2

So what do you do when you bake a bread and after its cooled you realize its not completely baked in the center?? Let me know what you folks do, but I decided to make a bread pudding with the 2/3rds baked bread.

This is how the whole unbaked bread pudding came about: I had to bake bread for my colleague’s b’day and decided to make pumpkin bread from King Arthur Flour’s Whole Grains Cookbook. Recipe called to bake it for one WHOLE hour. It was a weekday and I didn’t think that the bread needs to be baked for one WHOLE hour (based on what?? I don’t know!!!). So I decided to take it out around 52 minutes, please note that I checked the doneness with my cake tester and it came out clean (psst.. just so you know I did not test the center though, did the checking somewhere along the edges). After taking it out, I noticed there was a ridge on the top, didn’t think much about it and went about doing my clean up and getting the kitchen ready for the next day. After about an hour when I came back to see if it was cool enough to cut, I noticed that the ridge has now sunken and collapsed. OK—when I cut in the center, it was still a little gooey but not too bad, so cut around it and took it to work. Just for the record, nobody realized that some part of that bread was unbaked and everybody liked it.

So now I had a container of unbaked scraps which went into this yummy bread pudding this weekend. My googling for pumpkin bread pudding brought back results with regular bread and pumpkin added to the custard. But due to the circumstances I was in I had to do a role reversal and use pumpkin bread & simple custard. I cut down on the sugar used for the custard since there is enough sugar in the bread itself. I left the bread uncovered for almost half a day to dry them a little bit. I liked so much that may be next time I’ll bake the bread just to make this pudding.

Ingredients:
Pumpkin bread – 2 cups, chopped
Egg – 1
Soymilk (Cream or half-n-half or milk) – 1½ cups
Sugar – 2-3tsp

Method:

• Preheat oven to 350ºF.
  
• Whisk milk, sugar & egg in a small bowl.
  
• Grease a baking dish and add chopped bread. Pour the prepared custard and let the bread soak for 10-15 minutes. Bake for 30-40 minutes until a tester inserted in the CENTER comes out clean. Enjoy warm.

P.S.: Recipe for Pumpkin bread coming up soon.

Pumpkin & Whole Masoor dal Sprouts Stew

I’ve never tried sprouting whole masoor dal and when I saw Indira’s(@ Mahanandi) post, I wanted to give it a try. After about 2 days of soaking/draining/rinsing & sprinkling, I had beautiful sprouts.

The recipe for this sweet & tangy sambar type stew is from my dear friend V. Her original recipe used brown chickpeas and was little liquidy, I made it more like a stew. Simple with very few ingredients, but very very tasty. It gets better as it sits.

Ingredients:
Whole Masoor dal sprouts – 2 cups
Pumpkin – 3 cups, chopped
Tamarind Paste – 2tbsp
Jaggery (or light brown sugar) – 2tsp (or per taste)
Sambar powder (home-made or store-bought) – 2tsp (or to taste)
Salt – to taste

For tadka:
Mustard seeds – 1 tsp
Cumin seeds – 1tsp
Curry leaves – 6-12
Hing – pinch

Method:

• Add 4 cups of water to sprouts; bring them to a boil, then reduce the flame and simmer until they are 3/4th cooked through, about 5-10 minutes.
  
• In the meantime, microwave pumpkin pieces with a pinch of turmeric and salt until tender (but not falling apart), about 6-8 minutes.
  
• Heat 2tsp oil in a pan, add the tadka ingredients and once the seeds start to splutter add the pumpkin & sprouts. Cook for 2 minutes.
  
• Then add tamarind, jaggery, sambar powder, salt and 1cup water (or more if you want a more sambar like consistency). Cover and simmer till it reaches desired consistency.

Enjoy with steamed rice (or with rotis).




This lentil stew is off to MLLA-13 (My Legume Love Affair event) being guest hosted this month by lovely Sunshinemom (@ Tum Yum treats). MLLA is the brainchild of Susan @ Well Seasoned Cook.

Pumpkin Cake

I made this last week for welcome breakfast we had for my department director who was coming back from medical leave. She had ovarian cancer and had been on chemo for the past 6 months. She looks great now (even though she lost all her hair, she’s jazzing it up with fancy bandanas). She has a very positive attitude and I think that is what made her fight cancer successfully. So to celebrate her return all of us brought goodies for breakfast.

I made this pumpkin bundt cake from vegetarian times magazine. It’s a little healthy with whole wheat flour and soy milk, but not so healthy with butter. But why to count calories and fat when you are celebrating. This is the exact recipe from Vegetarian times.

Ingredients:
All-purpose flour – 2 cups
Whole wheat flour – 1 cup
Baking powder – 2tsp
Baking Soda- 1 tsp
Salt – ¼ tsp
Ground Cinnamon – 4tsp (I used only 2.5tsp)
Ground Nutmeg – 1 tsp
Canned Pumpkin puree – 1 cup
Buttermilk – 1cup (I used soy milk instead)
Oil – ½ cup (I used melted butter)
Vanilla essence – 2tbsp
Eggs- 2
Sugar – ½ cup
Brown Sugar – 1 cup

Orange Glaze:
Orange juice – 2tbsp
Confectioner’s sugar – 1cup
Vanilla essence – ½ tsp

Method:

• Pre-heat oven to 350°F. Grease a bundt pan (I used 9”x11” baking pan instead).
• In a bowl, mix flours, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg.
  
• In a small bowl, mix pumpkin puree, buttermilk, oil and vanilla essence.
  
• In a large bowl, beat eggs and sugars till the mixture turns light and thick, about 3-5 minutes.
  
• With a rubber spatula, alternatively fold in flour and pumpkin mixtures, making 3 flour additions and 2 pumpkin additions.
• Pour into prepared pan and bake for 35-45 minutes or until the cake springs back when touched and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Remove onto a wire rack to completely cool.
  
• For the glaze: Sift confectioners’ sugar into medium bowl. Add vanilla and 1 tablespoon orange juice; whisk to blend. Gradually add just enough additional orange juice until glaze is smooth and thick yet pourable. Slowly spoon glaze over cake, letting it drip down sides. Glaze was so yummy; I was licking the bowl like a little kid. Hehehehe.