I read earlier today that there's a pumpkin shortage. I love pumpkin as much, or more, than the average person... but this doesn't seem like a big problem to me initially. Are we really running out of pumpkin? It seems to me that I can't go anywhere lately without running into (or falling over) them. Hell, I have 3 on my porch right now.
The problem seems to be a shortage of canned pumpkin. Um, I've only ever cooked with canned pumpkin. What about Thanksgiving? I'm hosting it this year for the first time. (Gasp!) Well, if worse comes to worst, I'll just make this year's Thanksgiving pie with one of them, right? I was sort of thinking about it anyway, actually.
Well, that article mentions that you can't eat the jack-o-lantern variety. I'm guessing that's what I have. This leads me to a question - is the problem that people just don't usually eat them? Or is there something inedible about them?
A quick Google search leads me to what I can only hope is good information. It seems you can eat any of the pumpkins lining the shelves, porches or streets these days. But you might not want to. Apparently they are stringy and not sweet enough. They'll serve for baked goods, but not for pies. For pies (or soup), you'll want a different variety. A smaller variety. 3-6 pounds seems ideal. I do have a smaller one on the porch, but there's really no way to know what variety it is. What's a girl to do?
This all leads me to the conclusion that I need to schedule a pumpkin-hunting excursion. I'll need to rely on the nice people at the Farmer's Market to point me in the right direction. And then? Then, I'm going to kill (and eat) a pumpkin.
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