A Spotlight on Pumpkin

I recently embarked on a personal mission to see how many different things I could make with one pumpkin.

Because there's certainly a lot of food, as well as a surprising amount of potential in a single pumpkin!

I started with an absolute classic: pumpkin soup. Because my throat was feeling a little scratchy, I threw in a huge amount of garlic, ginger and turmeric.

Topped it with a jalapeño relish made last summer, a drizzle of coconut cream and torn coriander leaves, all alongside freshly baked focaccia. Wow! Lip-smacking!

But while that was cooking, I looked at the other ⅔ of my pumpkin and, reluctant to return it to the bowels of my fridge, I tried something a little new: pumpkin cake. Wow, wow, wow! Incredible! It tasted like a spice cake (the pumpkin flavour isn't powerful at all), but it sported an amazingly warm orange colour.

And the moistness - it was all one could dream of! Topped with cream cheese icing, walnuts and toasted pumpkin seeds (from, you guessed it! That very same pumpkin!). Safe to say, it didn't last long at all!

There was still ¼ of a pumpkin left, and at this point, I was committed. But what to make?

Have you ever tried pumpkin fritters?

Because my word, they make a divine light meal, starter or lunch. I went with the wholesome additions of spring onions, garlic and cumin, but there's plenty of opportunities to chop and change, depending on your preferred flavours. Served with sour cream and tomato chutney (again, from last summers bounty), they were gone in a trice.

I recently saw a recipe for Ouma’s sweet South African pumpkin fritters… might be time that I got myself another pumpkin and started again!