I'm Feeling a Little Nuts...

Every year, we take a family outing to the local (makeshift) pumpkin patch.  Gotta love those empty lots that once a year magically turn into a pumpkin patch and disappear as fast as Cinderella's coach.  What ever happened to a REAL patch where they actually GROW some pumpkins!?!?!  Anyways, every year, I cringe at the amount of $$ we dish out to buy an pumpkin for the kids to "carve" and use as a Halloween decoration.  What a waste!!  Think about it, we buy 10 lbs of food, carve it (more like mutilate it), set it out to rot and throw it away.  Then, we run to the grocery store to buy 15 cans of pumpkin over the next three months to make all the goodies that satisfy our holiday cravings.

So, this year, as I write, our Jack' O Lantern is sitting on a roasting pan at 350 degrees in my oven.  We waited until Halloween morning to pick out our victim, carved it up at 5pm, set it in the window for a few hours (safe from bugs) and stuck it in the refrigerator until today when I had time to cook it up.

From what I heard, the Jack O Lantern pumpkins are a little less intense in taste and more watery.  The solution...be careful when adding spices and after pureeing the flesh, let it strain.

Like I said, I'm feeling a little crazy cooking a Jack O Lantern, but hey, if it saves me from wasting an entire pumpkin, then it can't hurt to try it out.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Just an update--Here's the finished product...creepy :)