Stuffed & Roasted Pumpkin

A delicious veggie recipe for the Autumn

I am a seasonal person. I love to live and include in our daily life the different seasons through clothing, through the food on the table or the activities I practice.

The area where I grew up in Spain, the mountains north of Madrid, is mostly defined by granite rocks, pine trees and rosemary bushes which meant my seasons would remain green almost all year round and I experienced less colorful trees around my house in the autumn. But since I have been living in mid Sweden, I have experience the most colorful autumns ever through its vast and changing deciduous forest.

Here one can definitely feel the seasonal vibes through the warm colors of nature.

September and October brought the last summer harvest, the fallen leaves, the cozy evenings and the Halloween pumpkin season. Pumpkin cake, pumpkin latte, pumpkin curry...

The latest years living in Linköping I was able to find pumpkins quite easily in the supermarket as Halloween night was coming close. But this year I wasn't that able to find them for some reason.

It was not until we started moving to Stockholm that I found a bunch of them in the city market.

However, back to Ostergötland, there are a couple places to find beautiful and delicious pumpkins around Linköping when you can't find them in the city though.

Take note of these two:

A well known place around Östergötland is Hermelins Gronsaker Farm boutique in Skänninge.

Here you can pick up seasonal vegetables all year round and in certain season times they have their famous "självplock " days where you can pick up your own veggies from the garden beds, including pumpkins!

Another idea is the year round farmers market in Linköping. Yes! you read right, the farmers' market is very well known during the summer days in the city, however, it is not limited to the summer season.

There is a facebook group called "Reko Linköping" where you can find different particular and small sacale farmers who meet once every week or two weeks to sell their products. This happens in different parts around the city and you have to pre-order and pay the products in advance. You can find all kinds of swedish local products from veggies to honey, kombucha, eggs, meat, etc.

And after finding our pumpkin you can either carve it for halloween or make a delicious meal!

This is a recipe of a roasted and stuffed pumpkin and late summer veggies from a few weeks ago that I shared in my instagram. 😋

I hope you enjoy it!

INGREDIENTS:

These ingredients are easy to find in most supermarkets.

For the fresh herbs I always, always, always go to the Iman livis store in Sankt Larsgatan street in Linköping as it is very close to our apartment or the outdoor market in Trädgårdstorget. If you are somewhere else in Sweden, look for a middle east groceries' store or market.

There is almost always one in every city in Sweden and as they trade directly with Mediterranean countries, you can find nice bouquets or coriander, mint or parsley.

HOW TO PREPARE THE PUMPKIN:

1. Start by washing thoughtfully the skin of the pumpkin. If you are using the same variety as me (Hokkaido) the peel is edible, so you way just want to make sure is as clean as possible and eco so the peel hasn't sucked in many chemicals.

2. Carve the pumpkin empty. Cut the top of the pumpkin and leave the "hat" aside while you clean empty the pumpkin seeds. You want to keep the "hard meat" on the sides of the pumpkin in, so just take away seeds and spaghetti-like part.

3. Cut from these ingredients as much as you feel is needed to fill the pumpkin: the eggplant and sweet potato in small dices, cut the red onion in slices, chop the ginger, coriander and the chillies and mix it all in a bowl with salt, pepper, cumin, and generous amount of olive oil. These last one be real generous! Otherwise the pumpkin will come out dry. For a 2kg pumpkin I put around 100ml olive oil.

4. Fill the pumpkin with the mix and put the hat on top. Preheat the oven on 200ºC and cook for about 40min.

While the pumpkin is roasting you can prepare a side dish. We chose wild rice or dark rice to make it more fun and colorful. Follow the instructions on the box, but basically is 2 parts of water per 1 of rice and takes about 40 minutes to cook, so it is perfect to let prepare while the pumpkin is in the oven :)

Finally, you can serve it on the table with a delicious cumin and coriander sauce,

a recipe that I will soon upload ;)