All About Pumpkins: Surprise Chowder

Salutations, blogosphere! In case you missed it, we will be covering the benefits of pumpkin throughout the month of of October. So without further a due, let's go ahead and dive into this week's feature: a few ways to eat pumpkin.

When you think of pumpkin, I'm sure a traditional thanksgiving pumpkin pie is the first thing that comes to mind. But the gourd offers much more diversity than that: there's pumpkin bread, pumpkin chili, pumpkin soup, pumpkin cupcakes, pumpkin cheese cake, pumpkin ice cream, the list goes on and on, my friend.

Just to give you an idea of how you can use more pumpkin in your cooking (and have it taste good), I cooked up two delicious recipes with pumpkin.

First, there's my pumpkin & corn chowder. While my recipe includes a few more things, it was inspired by this recipe from Southern Living.

First you will need:

- 2 Tbs of butter or margarine

- 1 small, yellow onion minced

- 10 oz of whole kernel corn

- 16 oz of canned pumpkin

- 2 cups of water

- 2 chicken bouillon cubes

- 2 Tbs sugar

- 1 1/2 tsp of salt

- 1/4 tsp of ground cinnamon

- 1/8 tsp of nutmeg

- 1/8 tsp of ground pepper

- 2 c of Half & Half

I don't have a name for it yet, but the chowder is surprisingly delicious; and the taste of pumpkin is not overwhelming. It is a good overall taste of fall, especially when paired with a grilled cheese sandwich!

So here's what you do: first, melt the butter into your soup pan (you will only need that pan throughout this recipe). Then saute the minced onion before adding the corn and pumpkin. You'll want to stir that a bit before the next step.

After that it all nicely mixed,  start pouring in the water, cubes, and spices. After that is all in, continue to stir and heat until the mixture is boiling.

Double, double, toil and trouble...

When you get to the boiling point, simmer and add the cream. You will still need to stir it while the soup heats up, but do not let it boil!

Your finished product should be a nice, smooth, velvety soup with some random, delicious corn bits. I've made this several times now & every audience has loved it so far!