Plain

• 2 cups pumpkin seeds, washed
• 4 tbsp melted butter
• 1 1/2 tsp salt

Savory

• 2 cups pumpkin seeds, washed
• 4 tbsp melted butter
• 1/2 tsp garlic salt
• 2 tsp Worchestershire sauce

Lemony

• 2 cups pumpkin seeds, washed
• 4 tbsp melted butter
• 1 tsp lemon pepper

Halloweeny

• 2 cups pumpkin seeds, washed
• 4 tbsp melted butter
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp ground allspice

Spicy

• 2 cups pumpkin seeds, washed
• 4tbsp melted butter
• 1 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1/2 tsp thyme
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper

Preheat oven to 275. Line cookie sheet with foil. Put the pumpkin seeds on the cookie sheet and pour butter over them, mix well. Sprinkle pumpkin seeds with seasonings. Bake, stirring every 10 minutes until roasted, 30 minutes to 1 hour. The more wet the seeds are the longer they will take to roast.

Preheat oven to 375. Cut pumpkin in half and clean out all the seeds. Place cut side down in an ungreased baking pan. Bake in preheated oven for 1 hour or until pumpkin is tender when tested with a fork. Let cool; scrape the pumpkin meat from the shell, puree. Over the years I have done this several ways but I find that the easiest way to puree the pumpkin and get nice smooth pumpkin mush, is to use a food processor. Using a blender doesn’t work very well because the pumpkin is too thick, and it doesn’t mix well in the blender. Which means the pumpkin on the bottom of the blender is pureed really fine, but the stuff on top never touches the blades.

If the pumpkin is too juicy (which it most likely will be if it’s not a pie pumpkin), you can reduce the liquid by placing the puree in a shallow baking pan and bake (at 375) until it reaches the desired consistency.

To store- portion the pumpkin out into quart size freezer bags, making sure you label and date them so that you know that solid orange block is pumpkin 😉 Then freeze until you are ready to use it.