Dessert for One: Pumpkin Pie for One

I am genuinely proud of my pumpkin pie for one. What's so special about this pie?

• Delicious! I love pumpkin pie of any variety, make, or model. There is truly something special about a homemade pie. 
• Simple! People take their pie crusts seriously, for good reason. For most of us mortals, pie crusts are a pain. My solution anymore: pie without the crust!
• This is a real pumpkin pie. Don't get me wrong, try my vegan acorn squash pie if you are avoiding eggs or dairy. It's delicious, too! This pie was creamy and custardy. In other words, just right.

Here's a glimpse of the second! pie I made turned out of the pan.

Why, yes, I did take one of the most traditional pie recipes in America and cut it in half. Enjoy!

Pumpkin Pie for One

by Ace Nation

Keywords: bake dessert winter squash

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Ingredients (1 small pie)

• 1/4-1/2 cup sugar (depending on your taste)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice blend (or 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon ginger, and 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1 cup pumpkin puree
• 3/4 cup milk
• Non-stick cooking spray

Instructions

Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit.

Spray a small pie pan or a 2-cup casserole dish with non-stick cooking spray.

In a mixing bowl, stir all ingredients until well combined. Batter will be very thin.

Pour into prepared baking dish. Bake at 425 degrees for 15 minutes. Reduce temperature to 350 degrees and bake 35-45 minutes longer, until a knife inserted into the middle comes out clean.

Enjoy!

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My First Attempts at Frugal Cheesecake

Pumpkin Cheesecake 

Disclaimer: This is not my official recipe! This recipe is still a work in progress.

My first attempt at Pumpkin Cheesecake was created in an effort to salvage a failed ravioli filling. When researching winter squash ravioli recipes, most of the recipes included ricotta cheese. I assumed cream cheese would make a suitable substitution: it's creamy, soft, a similar color, and it's cheaper. I have said this before and I'm sure that I'll say this again: I'm a home-cook, not a foodie. I don't know that I have ever had ricotta cheese.

This is what I started with and...

Well, I blended the ingredients together and you can see what happened. I had something resembling the consistency of a creamy soup. I wasn't about to throw it away!

I imagined myself in a home-cook version of Chopped (if you haven't already figured it out, I was home alone, cooking for one). How would I redeem myself? While I had never made cheesecake that wasn't the Jello boxed stuff, I have read enough recipes to know that I what I had was probably the beginnings of a cheesecake. I added an extra egg, some sugar, a splash of vanilla, and some spices. I don't have a spring-form pan so I thought of using my muffin tin. To have some semblance of a crust and to be able to remove the cakes easily, I used the won ton wrappers I had planned on using for the ravioli.

What was the result? Pretty darn good. I felt so proud of myself at making cheesecake I bragged about it incessantly to my friends and made my neighborly friends (and official taste-testers) try it. They approved!

Z. hates squash so he had absolutely zero interest in trying my creation. In order to have my delightful life companion taste-test and to see if my last try was just a happy accident, I attempted a plain version. The results weren't quite as spectacular or creamy as the pumpkin cheesecake. I wonder if the pumpkin provided extra moisture the plain version was lacking.

Ingredients for plain cheesecake

Both times, the won ton wrappers were a problem. The edges that were exposed did not burn but were tough and sharp. The portion of the wrappers under the filling could not be cut. These little cakes became a finger food.

Plain cheesecake

I am going to work on improving this recipe. All the other recipes I have found require a large amount of cream cheese and are way larger than I need. I think my cheesecake's potential lies in its simplicity and small output. Any suggestions???

Here's What I Call a Hillbilly Recipe: Pumpkin Pudding

Normally, I pride myself on making great meals from scratch and going the extra mile to make ingredients myself. I do have a couple of exceptions. I think I have made homemade pudding one time in my life and that was years ago. Why would I need to? I have an undying love for Jell-O vanilla instant pudding...and I always have at least one box in my cupboard at all times.

I have no idea where I had the inspiration of combining pumpkin puree and instant pudding. Maybe I was thinking about The Pioneer Woman's creamy, luscious Pumpkin Smoothie and wishing it was creamier and not so cold?

Wherever the inspiration came from, this pudding is tasty! I went ahead and added a little extra vanilla and a few spices. I have made a couple of deserts using yams and acorn squash. I am guessing that they would also work well in place of the pumpkin. I did just buy 8 pounds of yams. Maybe yam pudding is in my future...

P.S. Towards the end of the batch, I tried adding a little extra pumpkin puree to the pumpkin-flavored pudding. Please avoid my mistake. Instead of making the pudding taste even more like pumpkin, it became rather vegetal. 1 cup of puree was perfect.

Pumpkin Pudding

by Ace Nation

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Cook Time: 0 minutes

Keywords: winter squash pudding

Ingredients (serves 6)

• 1 box (5.1 ounces) instant vanilla pudding mix
• 2 cups milk
• 1 cup pumpkin puree
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

Instructions

In a mixing bowl, with a whisk or a hand mixer, blend pudding mix and milk about 3 minutes. Gently stir in pumpkin puree, vanilla extract, and spice. Refrigerate until set, at least 5 minutes, then serve. Enjoy!

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Pumpkin Barley-Risotto Style

When searching for winter squash recipes, you will definitely come across ravioli and risotto. After successfully mastering pumpkin ravioli, I decided to give risotto a shot.

Butternut squash is most commonly used but I had a gorgeous squash from the farmer's market. It's called a sunset squash. The name does more justice to the beautiful color than my pictures. If you have ever seen a tree with red leaves in the fall that were so vibrant and red that they almost glowed they were so vibrant, that's what the skin of this squash looked like.

P.S. It was difficult to cut the squash like this. Looks pretty but I would only suggest you do slices if you are comfortable in the kitchen with a knife.

Feel free to use risotto rice. The only change to the directions would be the cooking time. Rice would only need about half the time. I have made barley risotto-style before and loved it. I really enjoy the flavor of barley but don't cook it that often because it takes so long. I should get more in the habit. Barley is cheap: around $0.70 per pound in these parts. Barley works great for risotto because it becomes tender but still has a nice bite. Just a few tidbits of hopefully useful knowledge:

• Barley takes a long time to cook. Everything was simmering away even with the stove set right between off and medium so I left it there. Once the barley hit the pan, it needed about 65 minutes to cook.
• I added water/stock about every ten minutes.
• I only stirred the pot every five minutes. You do not have to stand over the stove the whole time. Just please don't forgot about your glorious pot of food while it's cooking!

I had two secret ingredients. Many recipes I found only added chunks of squash. I wanted the flavor of the squash to be the star so in addition to the pieces of squash, I added a cup of squash puree. Not only did the make the flavor of the pumpkin the star, the puree added a nice creaminess.

My second secret ingredient was a granny smith apple. The tartness of the apple provided tasty balance to the sweet and savory pumpkin. I made sure to add the apple towards the end to make sure it still had a little bit of crispness. Below are a few shots of the barley in the process of cooking, a few extra tips I learned along the way, and the recipe. Enjoy!

This is to show where I kept the stove temperature the entire time: right in the middle between off and medium. The onions took ages to cook and 65 minutes passed between adding the barley to the pot and being on my plate but it was well worth it. Feel free to try cooking the barley at a slightly higher temperature. I have no idea what will happen.

The barley smelled delicious while toasting in the pan, much like my current favorite ale. I was inspired!

Here's what the pot looked like after the first addition of  water/stock. Don't be afraid of the color!

Pumpkin Barley-Risotto Style

by Ace Nation

Cook Time: about 60 minutes

Keywords: entree vegan winter squash barley

Ingredients (serves 3)

• 5-7 cups water, stock, or a combination
• 1 cup hulled barley
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 yellow or white onion, diced finely
• 3-4 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 cups roasted winter squash or pumpkin, diced into bite-sized pieces
• 1 cup roasted winter squash puree
• 1/2 14 ounce can of white beans (about 3/4 cup)
• 1 granny smith apple, peeled, cored, and diced

Instructions

Place the water or stock in a small sauce pan, bring to a simmer, and keep warm.

In another larger sauce pan, heat olive oil over medium-low to medium heat. Add onion, stirring occasionally, cook until soft and translucent, about 10 minutes.

Add garlic, stirring occasionally, cook until tender, about 5 minutes.

Add barley and cook until aromatic, about 3-4 minutes.

Stir in 1 1/2 cups of water/stock at a time and the squash puree, stirring about every 5 minutes until the liquid is mostly absorbed.

Then, add 1/2 water/stock at a time, stirring occasionally.

After about 50 minutes of adding 1/2 liquid, add the diced squash, white beans, and apple to the pan and additional water/stock as needed. At this time, I begin to add 1/4 cup water/stock at a time. Stir very gently.

Continue the process of adding water/stock and stirring until the barley is fully cooked. The grains will be tender but still slightly chewy.

Enjoy!

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Pasta with Pumpkin

As wonderful as pumpkin can be, I was not impressed with my Pasta with Pumpkin. Let me translate: I experimented and my meal was good enough to eat for dinner and the leftovers were my lunch the next day but that's the extent of it.

Here's what I used (and for directions look at my Pasta with Kale and Chickpeas recipe because I used basically the same process):

• olive oil
• onion
• garlic
• carrots
• zucchini
• kale
• white beans
• roasted pumpkin
• tomato paste
• harisa
• dry white wine
• toasted walnuts

The first problem was the texture. The pumpkin, white beans, and pasta all had a similar texture. Roasted squash may just not belong with pasta.

Normally, a splash of white wine like sauvignon blanc brings a pasta dish with sauteed vegetables together and makes a simple dish, taste luxurious. In this case, the bright, grassy wine clashed with the earthy, sweet pumpkin . Some sort of stock or broth would have been a better alternative.

I had some tomato paste left over from the night before. I had an idea that some bright, acidic tomatoes would be great with the pumpkin. Well, tomato paste does not have the same flavor or brightness of canned tomatoes. The tomato paste didn't add anything. I didn't even care for the flavor of the tomato paste with the other vegetables; it was just weird.

The real winner was the toasted walnuts on top of the pasta! If you've read my recent recipes, you'll see that out of the blue I am using walnuts frequently. Nuts are EXPENSIVE and I hardly every buy them, let alone cook with them. I was looking for some walnuts for my ravioli recipe and found a large bag of walnuts that were on clearance and half-price. There you go.

What should I have done differently? Any suggestions???

Pumpkin Ravioli

I am very proud of this meal! I had several firsts making this dinner. It was my first time:

• making ravioli
• trying winter squash ravioli
• and eating ravioli that did not come from a can or a freezer-bag.

What can I say? I've led a very sheltered life.

As far as non-desert pumpkin recipes, ravioli seems to be rather popular so I decided I should give it a try. I wanted to keep my version on the cheap side so there were a few alterations I needed to make. The first challenge I had to figure out was what to do about the pasta. I haven't seen fresh pasta sheets in the local markets so that wasn't a possibility. I love making meals from scratch but I'm not ready to tackle homemade pasta. I settled on wonton wrappers because:

• they're cheap, just $1.89 for a package
• and I can use them in other recipes.

The ravioli are very delicate and can easily go from ravioli to pumpkin puree with noodle sheets. Trust me. I learned a few things cooking two batches of ravioli that just might help you:

• Don't overcrowd the pot because they will stick together.
• When you place the ravioli in the pot, swirl the water a few moments. This will help the ravioli from sticking to each other...and the bottom of the pot. 
• Be very gentle when taking the ravioli from the cooking water. I used a large slotted spin to remove the ravioli one by one from the pot.
• Drizzle the ravioli with a little olive oil after cooking so they don't stick together.

Well, if you would like pumpkin-flavored cream cheese soup, try adding cream cheese. Don't fret my friends! I found another use for that pumpkin-cream cheese concoction (you'll have to check back soon to find out)! So, when the cream cheese did not work, I decided the easiest route was to abandon cheese all together because the pumpkin becomes very creamy, anyway, when slow roasted. I just seasoned the pumpkin puree with salt and red pepper flakes. This was simply perfect!

The last challenge was to take care of the sauce. Sage and butter is a traditional topping for winter squash ravioli but I wanted something more substantial. I was already planning on using shallot (totally worth the extra cost in this case) and garlic. I figured out that if I used them in the sauce, I would have less work to do with the filling. I knew the earthy bitterness of the kale would compliment the sweet and creamy pumpkin.

I have to say, this is the best kale I have ever made! Normally, I just use a little olive oil and go from there. This time, I added some butter to the olive oil. Hello! I love my kale but this particular meal had extremely tender and flavorful kale. I am making this kale again. Enjoy!

Winter Squash Ravioli with Kale

by Ace Nation

Keywords: vegetarian winter squash wonton wrapper

Ingredients

For the Ravioli

• Wonton wrappers
• About 1 cup roasted pumpkin puree
• Kosher salt
• Red pepper flakes or ground black pepper, to taste

For the Kale

• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
• 1 large shallot, cut into half-moon slices
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 cups kale (per person), chopped
• 1/4 cup walnuts (per person), toasted and chopped

Instructions

For the Ravioli

Season the pumpkin puree with kosher salt and red pepper flakes (or black pepper) to taste.

Place about 1 1/2 teaspoons of seasoned puree in middle of a wonton wrapper.

Dip a finger in water and run around the edges of one half.

Fold one corner over so that it lines up with the opposite corner.

Press the edges together firmly with your fingers to seal. Set aside finished ravioli and continue the process until you have the desired amount of ravioli.

To cook Ravioli

Bring a pot of water to a gentle boil. Place ravioli in water being careful not to overcrowd the pan. Cook about 3 minutes (time may change depending on the brand of wrappers). Very carefully remove from water using a large slotted spoon. Drizzle with olive oil to prevent the ravioli from sticking to each other.

For the Kale

Heat olive oil and butter in a large high-sided skillet over medium-low to medium heat.

Add the shallot to the pan. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 5 minutes.

Add garlic, stirring occasionally, cook until tender, about 3 minutes.

Add kale to the pan and season with kosher salt. Place lid on pan and let cook until kale is tender, stirring every few minutes, about 8-10 minutes.

To serve

Place desired amount of ravioli on a plate (about 6-8 per person), top with sauteed kale, and garnish with toasted walnuts.

Enjoy!

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Pioneer Woman's Pumpkin Smoothie

If you like pumpkin, MAKE THIS SMOOTHIE. Period. I will not believe you are a pumpkin fan until you try this. I normally avoid smoothies unless it's my Pineapple-Coconut Smoothie as I like to see what my food looked like and I also enjoy the act of chewing but I will make an exception for this pumpkin smoothie.

I am moderately to highly obsessed (depending on the day) with The Pioneer Woman. She had posted her recipe for a pumpkin smoothie some time ago. Of course, I read her post but dismissed her recipe. A pumpkin smoothie? That sounded weird. Well, when I was trying to find new pumpkin/winter squash recipes, I kept seeing that scrumptious little glass.

Since all the Pioneer Woman recipes I've made are delicious and she doesn't know this yet but she's one of my food mentors, I trusted her on this one and I had to try her pumpkin smoothie. 4 smoothies later, I am a pumpkin smoothie believer.

I even used skim milk and nonfat plain yogurt (1.Lame I know but we're on this let's try to eat healthier kick and 2. If you can find it, Nancy's yogurt is so creamy and delectable even if it is nonfat) and this smoothie still tasted creamy and naughty.

I am going to leave you with this profound thought: If this pumpkin smoothie was awesome with plain pumpkin puree (with just a hint of spice), I wonder it would taste like with pumpkin butter...?

Winter Squash Challenge: Recipe Review

I love baking quick breads. My arsenal includes banana bread, apple sauce bread, and carrot bread. Why? They're easy to make and cheap! So, when I was planning on a winter squash challenge, I thought I would add pumpkin bread to the mix.

I came across a recipe for Honey Whole Wheat Pumpkin Bread on Cookie and Kate. I picked this recipe for several reasons:

• Quick breads can easily go from healthy to a desert-y indulgence. I wanted a bread I could pack in my lunch without feeling guilty and this fit the bill.
• I really liked Kate's suggestions of spices! I wouldn't have thought of adding ginger.
• I had just purchased my first bag of whole wheat pastry flour. Normally, I substitute flours and I was happy to try a recipe that called for whole wheat flour. 
• One of the ingredients is millet! I have to admit, I haven't tried this bread with the millet yet. I wanted to get an idea of what this bread tasted like before becoming more adventurous. Next time, I am definitely trying it with the millet!

Roasting a Pumpkin

I'm sure like many of you, one of my favorite Halloween traditions was pumpkin carving. Picking out the perfect pumpkin was quite the ordeal. Every year my elementary school would have some sort of fundraiser, loading the school stage with hay bales and pumpkins. I would usually pick out the biggest pumpkin there and somehow convince my mom that I needed at least three of them. I can hear it now: Z. telling me I haven't changed at all with that exasperated sigh that I find endlessly entertaining.

Carving would wait until a Friday or Saturday night because this undertaking required an entire evening. We covered the entire table with layers of newspapers. I couldn't wait to get my little hands inside the pumpkin, scooping out slimy, stringy seeds. When that task was done, I would draw a face on the pumpkin that I would then carve. I had no creativity when it came to drawing nor the skills required so I usually ended up with lot of geometric shapes: triangle eyes and a big smiling mouth with triangle-shaped teeth.

I couldn't wait to turn the lights off and see my pumpkin glowing for the first time. I always made a concerted effort to place the tea light in just the right spot where you could not see it when looking directly at the pumpkin. Then, my pumpkins would be placed on the front stoop, decorating our concrete steps until a few days after Halloween. I was always a little sad to see those soft, now off-colored squashes be thrown away.

This year, instead of making a jack-o-lantern, I tried roasting a pumpkin. I was home alone for an entire weekend and the pumpkin adventure helped keep me entertained. Currently, I have tried four new pumpkin recipes, five if you include roasting the thing.

I love the homemade pumpkin puree I created. I think all my recipes benefited from having the freshest pumpkin possible and the roasting brought out the pumpkin's sweetness and depth. I definitely would not recommend this to someone who is not comfortable in the kitchen or does not want to dedicate an entire afternoon to a pumpkin. If it tells you anything about how delicious the pumpkin was, I'm roasting another pumpkin or two before they disappear for the season.

To begin, I removed the seeds. My pumpkin was too large just to cut in half so I ended up slicing it in thirds. The difficulty in cutting the pumpkin would be my biggest reason for not recommending this recipe to those not as experienced in the kitchen. I took my time, getting a cut started, then after making sure all fingers were accounted for and out of the way, I kind of wedged the knife and split a section of the pumpkin open.

After I had my wedges of pumpkin, I scooped out the seeds and pulp. I never liked our homemade roasted pumpkin seeds with the outside white shell. I do love pepitas so I tried hulling the pumpkin seeds myself. FAILURE ALERT. I looked up many different tips and suggestions on how to hull pumpkin seeds. The directions were all very similar. So, I washed the seeds, boiled them for 30 minutes, and tried to open the shells (a few folks that I came across suggested waiting for the clean seeds to dry then gently crushing the shells). The hull was very soft but unless there was a tear, the inner seed or pepita did not want to come out. It was infuriating work so I gave up.

The rest of the roasting process was simple. I sprayed the cut sides of the pumpkin with nonstick cooking spray, placed the pumpkin chunks cut-side down on a baking sheet, and placed in a oven that had been preheated to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. To get really soft pumpkin, I'm talking I started creating pumpkin mash just by pressing the pumpkin with a finger, I let it roast for about 1 hour. I removed the baking sheet from the oven and let the pumpkin cool until I could touch the flesh. I then removed the skin.

Here's another tip: Let the pumpkin cool and the skin comes off very easily.

I had removed about half of the pumpkin from the oven after about 45 minutes. My intention was that half the pumpkin would be puree and the other half would be more firm and diced. Well, that plan did not work so well. The pumpkin was very soft and then didn't have much texture when I tried cooking with it. I only made one recipe with diced pumpkin. I'm not giving up! I'll just have to cook it even less next time.

In batches, I pureed the pumpkin in my food processor/blender until very smooth. The pumpkin was so soft and tender that this took hardly any time but I did have to frequently scrape down the sides to make sure the whole batch was processed. As this was a smaller pumpkin and I had lots of recipes to make, I stored the fresh pumpkin puree in the refrigerator. If I was planning on keeping the puree longer, I would suggest freezing the puree in freezer bags and laying them flat. If I am freezing something with a more liquid texture, I can pretty easily break off the amount of food I'd like to use when frozen in a freezer bag. This is what I did with my pumpkin puree for my pumpkin smoothie.

I roasted a second pumpkin alongside a second squash I picked up from the farmer' market called a sunset squash (future ingredient in barley risotto!). This second time I preheated the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. I found that this didn't change much for the pumpkin but I preferred the results for the smaller squash. The squash had more of that caramelized brown color I wanted while remaining firm after cooking for 20 minutes.

Yum!