P is for Pumpkin Pie

    We had a volunteer pumpkin come up in my garden this year, and having never grown a pumpkin, I erroneously thought it was a zucchini that for some reason only produced round zucchini. So, we were picking and eating these round zucchini, until one escaped our notice long enough to turn into a pumpkin.  Boy, did I feel silly!  Especially since I wrote about my "zucchini" right here in my blog. 
    Anna wanted to make our lone pumpkin into a pie, and so I decided to give it a shot, even though I had never made a pie with anything but canned pumpkin puree.  Here's how it turned out.

Here's the pumpkin; rather pretty, isn't it?

 All opened up.



The kids had tons of fun getting the seeds out.

Once we had the seeds cleaned out, I cut the pumpkin in half and put it a 9 by 13 baking dish, with about a half inch of water and baked it until the pumpkin was tender.

 Samuel, always eager to help, helps me close the oven door.

While we are waiting for the pumpkin to cool, we start on the crust.

 Anna is hard at work cutting in the fat.  Abriel and Samuel want to see what's going on.

 Here's the dough all ready to be chilled.   We took a break for supper and put the babies to bed after this.

 Now that the pumpkin is cool, Anna peels the skin off and mashes it up.

 I rolled out the crust, and put it in the pan.

 Just for fun, we used the scraps to cut out leaf shapes and put them around the crust.

 Anna mixes and measures the ingredients.

 Now it ready to go in the oven.

 Finished at last!

It was delicious!  Probably one of the best tasting pumpkin pies I've ever had.

Here is the recipe for any who may wish to know.



Pumpkin Pie

• 1 1/2 cups pumpkin puree
• 1 1/2 cups half and half
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Whisk ingredients together in a large bowl, then pour into a crust that has been heated until hot to the touch.  Bake at 375 for 35 to 45 minutes.