Intermittently and cooperatively written by Bill and Jean Venrick

Every year about this time of the year my wife gets ready to stock our freezer with pumpkin puree. For some cooks that may not be surprising. The surprising thing about the beginnings of this restocking procedure is that of procuring the pumpkins. Rarely do we buy pumpkins – no we don’t steal them from a farmer’s field or take them off neighbors’ front lawn displays. But this year we came close. Our daughter works for a small catering company that has parties throughout the spring, summer and fall and she knows her mother’s taste in the cuisine part of living and when her employer was getting rid of a bunch of pumpkins, gourds and dried corn after the last of their fall parties, our daughter asked her boss, “What are you going to do with all that?” “They’re going into the dumpster…” and before he could get those words completely out of his mouth our daughter said, “Call me a dumpster…” Well, not in those exact words but she made it plain she would “take care of those pumpkins and stuff”.

Among those pumpkins our daughter rescued from the dumpster were several “large” pumpkins, probably 15-20 pounds (tops). We brought two of those home from our visit with our daughter as she culled out her find and Jean, my wife, had specific plans for those two large pumpkins. One was probably about 12” across and just barely fit in one side of our twin sinks. After washing it I got the job of cutting it into halves and then halving those pieces. Using a good stout butcher knife is essential and a steady hand helps.

Jean takes over again, putting those quarter-pieces-of-pumpkins into the microwave oven to “soften them up” so she can further pare them down to chunks. Cutting off the skin to discard, she cut the pumpkin into chunks about an inch or slightly larger and filled a large pan putting just a little water in the bottom of the pan to cook them down. When in that chunk stage she showed me how the pumpkin fruit is; looking closely it appears to be grainy but a closer examination reveals it is rather like thick threads compressed unbelievably tight. The only time you can see these threads is when you break the fruit apart, which makes it appear stringy.

After cooking these pieces Jean runs the cooked pumpkin through a food processor to make the pumpkin puree. My wife got enough pumpkin puree to make 16-18 pies from ONE of those pumpkins. She has a reputation of making the best pumpkin pie in our large circle of friends and family. She fills former cottage cheese containers with the puree and there is enough puree in one container for one large pie and a medium pie. Sometimes she uses what is called an “impossible pie” recipe—a pie without a crust!

I know some ladies will read this and say that’s too much bother. That may be for some but to us who carve out a living from two Social Security checks and an occasional bit of interest from some CD savings it is not too much bother – in fact, we work it out together. Go ahead and buy your cans of “cold pack” pumpkin – we will keep on messing around with pumpkins people don’t know what to do with them except throw them away. I prefer my “homemade” pumpkin to the store-bought canned kind because it seems more moist, not so dry and doughy tasting. As long as I can cut up a pumpkin (with occasional help from my husband) I will continue to “make my own”.

PS – Old Dad laid claim to those dried corn displays and while this is being written a small population of squirrels is enjoying that corn as much as we will enjoy eating those pumpkin pies this coming year – don’t think I will have to buy a 25# sack of corn from the feed store as soon as I did last winter. Also I have found a use for old peanut butter – I made up a wooden stand with two sized dowels positioned zig-zagged on opposite sides – one of which could be used as a “standing place” and the other, a larger dowel, I spread-on this old peanut butter. The squirrels have taken to this new diet with great interest – now the problem will be to find some more old peanut butter!

THE WORDWRIGHT