The Amazing and True Adventures of Squash and Pumpkin



Squash and Pumpkin do some light cleaning. Susan Loper/Thoughtful Consumption

My friend and blogging buddy Susan has a whimsical wit and a CSA subscription. Some folks open up their produce boxes and see supper on the hoof (so to speak); Susan sees comic opportunity. Last fall, she took the weekly cucurbitae and had a little fun, with a post called “More Fun with Squash and Pumpkin.”

Squash and Pumpkin plan Halloween mischief. Susan Loper/Thoughtful Consumption

Just like other vegetable tales that met with mainstream success (“Attack of the Killer Tomatoes,” “VeggieTales” and many many movies with Sylvester Stallone), Squash and Pumpkin sprouted sequels:

Even more fun with Squash and Pumpkin

Squash and Pumpkin Ride Again!

Squash and Pumpkin Keep it Real

Squash and Pumpkin bundle up for cooler weather. Susan Loper/Thoughtful Consumption

If you need a seasonal giggle, or inspiration before decorating your house for fall, visit Squash and Pumpkin over at Thoughtful Consumption. Thanks, Susan, for letting me use your pictures and tell another corner of the world about S&P!

Something from Nothing: Stuffed Pumpkin Blossoms




Tempura goat cheese and ricotta stuffed pumpkin blossoms
by Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

  If you ever talk to someone who lived through the Great Depression, you may hear the phrase, spoken with respect,  "And my mama/daddy/grandma knew how to make something from nothing." The notion of creating treasure from someone else's trash can be found everywhere from art - Georgia's own folk artist Howard Finster, for instance, to restaurant and home kitchens. The something-from-nothing philosophy got my grandparents through the Depression, and it’s a principle in use today as cooks practice frugality in the kitchen. Farm to table, nose to tail, and now, blossom to fruit.

I thought about "something from nothing" a while back when my friend Jason Parrish invited me to see his pumpkin farm in south Douglas County. Up until a couple years ago, Parrish was in the financial services industry. His wife is a lawyer and they have two young sons. Like many families in these challenging economic times, Parrish is making something from next to nothing – a bag of seeds, some mulch, some water, (actually a lot of water in this very dry August), using his own labor and initiative to build a business.

Jason asked if I’d ever used pumpkin blossoms in cooking. He planted pumpkin seeds beginning in June, planning on a rolling harvest in autumn, and he had excess blossoms. I needed a botany lesson reboot:  pumpkins produce two kinds of blossoms, male and female. Only the female develops fruit, so after the male blossoms have done their duty of pollinating the females (with a little help from bees and other bugs), they aren't needed. In other words, pumpkins are like Elizabeth Taylor in her prime, taking the best of what's offered, mating-wise, and leaving the rest just hanging on the vine.




The female pumpkin blossom. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

 The silver lining, or to stretch the Liz Taylor theme out, a diamond-encrusted lining, is that cooks can pick the pumpkin blossoms and stuff them with rich fillings, dip them in batter and fry them up for a crispy, creamy taste of summer.

A male pumpkin flower. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

After spending a very hot August morning in the pumpkin patch, I turned to Executive Chef Christina Curry of Epicurean Endeavors for advice on using the blossoms, based on her experience with zucchini flowers. She suggested a tempura batter and plans B and C for future blossom projects: dicing the fowers and using them in a fritter, or a quick high temp roast with olive oil, herbs, salt and pepper. "You are only limited by your imagination, so try some different combinations and decide which you like best," she wrote in her reply to my inquiring email.

On her advice, I created a lemony goat cheese filling, cutting the rich chevre with ricotta and flavoring the mixture with basil and chives from my herb garden. I created a tempura batter using rice flour, just the right light texture for the delicate blossoms.

Pumpkin blossoms by Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

If you’re lucky enough to be able to purchase pumpkin or squash blossoms, plan to cook with them right away. If you’re picking the blossoms, make sure that they have not been treated with any kind of pesticide, and look for the blooms without the female bump behind the blossom. When you open up the male blooms, it’s quite clearly a male, just so you know. Keep them in a closed brown paper bag or zipper lock bag with a slightly damp paper towel. It’s best to pick pumpkin or squash blossoms early in the day, before they close up for their afternoon naps.To clean the blossoms, rinse them off very lightly with water, and check for signs of critters or mildew inside. Pinch and pull out the stamen.


Pumpkin blossoms by Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books


To fill the blossoms, I like to use a baby feeding spoon – another reason never to clean out the silverware drawer – those little guys are so handy. Scoop the filling into the flowers. When all the blossoms are stuffed, heat the oil in a pan, and have a paper towel-lined plate handy. Have the mayo ready and your diners on call. Mix the batter, dip the blossoms and fry. Drain on paper towels and serve.

Pumpkin blossoms waiting to be washed. By Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

Tempura Battered, Goat Cheese -Stuffed Pumpkin Blossoms

Filling:
 ½ cup ricotta (lowfat is fine)

½ cup goat cheese

1 teaspoon lemon zest (about a ½ lemon’s worth)

Pinch salt

A couple turns of freshly cracked black pepper

¼ cup loosely packed basil leaves, thinly sliced (chiffonade)
½ teaspoon chopped chives


Tempura Battered Pumpkin Blossoms

1/3 cup rice flour (look in the Latin foods section of the market)

1/3 cup all purpose flour

Pinch of salt

1 egg yolk

1 cup seltzer

One dozen fresh, organic pumpkin blossoms

Vegetable or canola oil for frying


Lemony mayo

½ cup mayonnaise mixed with juice of ½ lemon


1. Make the mayo first. Either Homemade, or jazz up good-quality storebought with a squeeze of lemon juice. Keep in refrigerator while cooking the pumpkin flowers.

2. Mix up the filling: In a medium bowl, combine ricotta, goat cheese, lemon zest, basil and chives. Season to taste with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

3. Using a baby feeding spoon and a fair amount of patience, place about a tablespoon of filling in each blossom. If the bloom is tightened, use a paring knife to cut a slit along the side. Fold the petals over the filling.

4. Set up a frying station. Fill a Dutch oven with 2 inches of canola oil and set over medium-high heat. In a medium bowl, stir together rice flour, all-purpose flour, salt and egg yolk. Whisk in seltzer. Adjust the batter consistency to your liking by adding either a bit more flour or a bit more seltzer – I like the batter on the thin side.

5. Oil is ready when a test dribble of batter bubbles to the surface. Using the stem as a hand-hold, dip each stuffed blossom in the batter then place gently into the bubbling oil. These cook very quickly – about 3 minutes per side. Drain on paper towels and serve with lemony mayo on the side.




Fried, stuffed pumpkin blossoms. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

 Text and images copyright 2011, Lucy Mercer.

Many thanks to Jason for sharing the pumpkin flowers and the Atlanta Botanical Gardens and Christina Curry for culinary guidance.

The frost on the pumpkin



Glass pumpkins at the Atlanta Botanical Garden. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books


The frost on the pumpkin is a phrase that weathermen and old timers toss about this time of year, but I've never been too sure what it means or the origin of the phrase. If I'd been raised in the Midwest, I may have known it - just like Georgians are schooled on Sidney Lanier's poetry ("Out of the hills of Habersham, Down the valleys of Hall"), apparently Indianans are raised on the poetry of James Whitcomb Riley, the "Hoosier Poet."

The poem concerns the turn of the seasons on a mid-19th century Indiana farm. It's in dialect, but the charm of the lines shines through:

WHEN the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock,
And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin' turkey-cock,
And the clackin' of the guineys, and the cluckin' of the hens,
And the rooster's hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence;
O, it's then the time a feller is a-feelin' at his best,
With the risin' sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest,
As he leaves the house, bareheaded, and goes out to feed the stock,
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.
They's something kindo' harty-like about the atmusfere
When the heat of summer's over and the coolin' fall is here—
Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossoms on the trees,
And the mumble of the hummin'-birds and buzzin' of the bees;
But the air's so appetizin'; and the landscape through the haze
Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days
Is a pictur' that no painter has the colorin' to mock—
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.
The husky, rusty russel of the tossels of the corn,
And the raspin' of the tangled leaves as golden as the morn;
The stubble in the furries—kindo' lonesome-like, but still
A-preachin' sermuns to us of the barns they growed to fill;
The strawstack in the medder, and the reaper in the shed;
The hosses in theyr stalls below—the clover overhead!—
O, it sets my hart a-clickin' like the tickin' of a clock,
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.
Then your apples all is gethered, and the ones a feller keeps
Is poured around the cellar-floor in red and yaller heaps;
And your cider-makin's over, and your wimmern-folks is through
With theyr mince and apple-butter, and theyr souse and sausage too!...
I don't know how to tell it—but ef such a thing could be
As the angels wantin' boardin', and they'd call around on me—
I'd want to 'commodate 'em—all the whole-indurin' flock—
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

 

With Riley's words as inspiration, I concocted a dessert of spiced pumpkin custard topped with frost, a billowy pillow of meringue.

Pumpkin custards with meringue. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

The Frost on the Pumpkin:

Pumpkin Custards with Meringue

Serves 4

1 cup heavy cream

1 egg yolk plus 2 whole eggs, lightly beaten

1/2 cup canned pumpkin puree

2 tablespoons maple syrup

1 tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon allspice.

1. Preheat oven to 325. Butter four 1/2 cup custard cups. Fill a teakettle with water and heat to boiling.

2. Heat cream in a small, heavy saucepan. Remove from heat and temper the yolks by slowly pouring half of the cream into the egg yolks, whisking all the while. Pour the yolk mixture into the remaining cream. Stir in pumpkin, maple syrup, sugar, cinnamon and allspice. Strain the mixture and pour into custard cups.

3. Set the custard cups in a baking pan. Place pan  in oven and gently pour boiling water from teakettle into pan, halfway up the sides of the cups, being careful not to splash the custards.

4. Bake at 325 for about 40 minutes, or until set. Remove from oven and let cool. These are delicious at this point, but if you want to gild the lily (or Indiana's state flower, the peony!), add a frosting of meringue.

Digging in to a meringue-topped pumpkin custard. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

Meringue

4 egg whites

1/3 teaspoon cream of tartar

7 tablespoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Pinch of salt

1. In the very clean bowl of an electric mixer, pour in egg whites and and cream of tartar and whip lightly for a minute. Gradually increase speed of mixer and add sugar one tablespoon at a time until the peaks are stiff and glossy. Stir in vanilla extract and a pinch of salt.

2. Swirl meringues onto pumpkin custards and bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for about 10 minutes or until lightly brown. Serve warm.

 

A pumpkin from my garden. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books.

Text & images copyright 2010, Lucy Mercer with the exception of the text of the poem.

"The Frost is on the Punkin" quoted from www.bartleby.com

The glass pumpkins are from the Cohn-Stone Studios in California and are on display at the Atlanta Botanical Garden. 

The recipes are adapted from the Martha Stewart Cookbook (1995, Clarkson Potter)

French toast with a funny name: Bostock

Pumpkin bostock. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

 I’m a half-hearted gardener at best - each spring, I clear out the weeds from the flower bed by the driveway and hand the girls seed packets and let them go to town. This year, we planted zinnias and daisies for the bright flowers, pumpkins and watermelons for the kid-pleasing factor (note: Burpee's Cut and Come Again Zinnia is always a winner). They all combined to yield a crazy quilt of blooms and vines in the garden. We faithfully watered through the summer, and in August, the vines got serious and shot out like Audrey II, taking over the garden bed and sending forth  blooms. I wondered if pumpkin blossoms could be stuffed like squash blossoms, with goat cheese, then battered and fried. (and indeed they can, here's a visit to the future: Stuffed Pumpkin Blossoms)

In September, a fruit formed, and here she is, our own little pumpkin buddy:

 Pumpkin is the flavor of fall and I use it to flavor Bostock, the French toast with the funny name. Using Francis Lam’s formula, I infused Challah slices with maple syrup, slathered them with seasoned pumpkin butter, broiled them and topped them with snappy crystallized ginger.

I didn't harvest our homegrown fruit for this treat, instead using canned pumpkin.

Pumpkin Butter

This makes quite a large amount. You may halve this quantity, or make the whole and freeze it until Christmas - a jar of pumpkin butter is a coveted gift.
1 cup apple cider or apple juice

1 ½ teaspoons ginger

1 ½ teaspoons cinnamon

¼ teaspoon cloves

1 tablespoon orange zest

2 tablespoons orange juice

1 ¼ cup sugar

Pinch salt

2 (15 oz.) cans pumpkin puree

1. In a saucepan over medium heat, combine apple cider, flavorings and sugar. Stir and let come to a boil. Lower heat and stir in pumpkin puree. Let cool. Place in plastic container and keep in refrigerator.

Maple Glaze

½ cup maple syrup

½ cup water

½ teaspoon vanilla

Pinch salt

1. In a saucepan over medium heat, combine all ingredients. Bring to a boil, then remove from heat and let cool.

Pumpkin bostock with maple and ginger. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

Pumpkin Bostock with Maple and Ginger
Makes 6 sevings

1 recipe Maple Glaze

½ cup Pumpkin Butter

6 slices Challah bread, 1 ½ inches thick, stale or left at room temperature for a couple hours

1 tablespoon crystallized ginger, finely chopped

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Prepare a sheet pan with foil and a nonstick grid, if you have one. Dip bread slices in maple glaze and squeeze out extra liquid. Place on grid-covered baking sheet.

2. Spread each toast with pumpkin butter. Bake at 350° for 15 minutes. Your kitchen will be unbelievably fragrant at this point.

3. Remove toasts from ovens and sprinkle with chopped crystallized ginger. Serve with hot, black coffee.

Text and images © 2010, Lucy Mercer.

Halloween Cakes

Graveyard Cake

Above is from Halloween 2008, a graveyard cake, not quite as fancy as in years past, but homemade, delicious, and lots of fun for the kids to create. The headstones are Pepperidge Farm Milano cookies, the ghosts are Peeps and the border is pretzels. No prizes, but still a fun project.

Pound Cake Pumpkins by Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

Halloween 2007, featuring one cute kid and three big pumpkin cakes. I baked pound cake batter in every Bundt pan in the house and frosted two together to make pumpkins. The leaves are fondant, created by the cute kid. This cake was very heavy, delicious, and won the school's award for creativity!