What Did You Do With Your Jack-o-lantern?

Following the example of a neighbor friend whose delicious-looking/smelling pumpkin muffins provided ample motivation, I cooked up our jack-o-lanterns this year. Why had I never thought of doing this before?

I was able to cut two jack-o-lanterns (into four or five pieces each) and squeeze the pumpkin parts into our large electric roaster oven. I let them roast for a couple hours until they were very soft. Then I scraped the flesh from the skin and mashed it in a large bowl. I repeated the process with our remaining two jack-o-lanterns.

This gave me A LOT of pumpkin puree! It was definitely time to pull out some favorite pumpkin recipes. This week, we've had Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake, Wild Mushroom and Pumpkin Risotto, and Pumpkin Carrot Swirl Bars (modified with dairy-free substitutes, of course!).

Meanwhile, there was still A LOT of pumpkin puree! After a little of investigative web-hunting, I decided to use my silicone muffin cups to make frozen half-cup portions of pumpkin for future use. (I call these my pumpkin pucks because, removed from the cups and stored in the freezer, they look like a bunch of orange hockey pucks!) I think I have about 24 cups of pumpkin in my freezer, and I am excited to keep exploring our pumpkin potential!