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| Baked whole pumpkins with gooey cheesy wonderfulness |
Firstly I would like to start off by apologising for things being a bit quiet here at ‘twicebitten’ towers over the last month. I’ve been backpacking around Northern India and had rather hoped to come back with lots of awesome curry recipes to share with you. Sadly I’ve come back empty handed. None of the recipes from a day at an Udaipur cookschool have met my exacting standards so I thought I would honour the freezing late Autumn weekend with a real comfort food warmer; whole baked pumpkin with lots of lovely cream and gooey cheese. Cholesterol, what cholesterol. This is eating in the danger zone!
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| pumpkins |
Since we got back it feels like one massive Christmas explosion, everywhere I look is party dresses, wreaths and discounted alcohol. I’ve caught the Crimbo bug and boy have I got it bad. It’s certainly more enjoyable than that bout of Delhi-belly I inevitably had (groan). I guess the reason for my excitement is because it’s the time of year when all my favourite people in the whole world come back to Scotland and I get a fortnight full of long boozy lunches, side splitting evenings and the best hugs around. I can’t wait, roll out the turkey. 4 weeks and counting…
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| Baked whole pumpkins |
This baked whole pumpkin recipe is so simple, it’s great to just pop in the oven, grab the Sunday papers and curl up for an hour before pulling it out and tucking in. It’s lazy weekend perfection. This dish works great like a fondue, dunking your bread into the gooey cheesy wonderfulness or alternatively you can scoop the pumpkin flesh into the cheesy mixture and then smear it on top of something like thick slices of sourdough toast.
Baked whole pumpkin with cream and gooey cheese – serves 2
Oven preheated to 180°
2 small pumpkins or squash such as acorn squash
175g of melty alpine cheese such as comte
125ml double cream
1/4tsp freshly grated nutmeg
salt and pepper to season
Take off the tops of the pumpkins and scoop out the seeds with a spoon.
Add the nutmeg, cheese and cream to the pumpkin cavity and pop the top of the pumpkin back on.
Bake in the oven for an hour to an hour to an hour and a quarter depending on the size of your pumpkins.
You may need to cover with tinfoil if they are beginning to look a bit burnt after 20-30 mins.
You can tell when your pumpkins are cooked if you are able to easily stick a knife into the flesh.
Season to taste.
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| Baked whole pumpkins with gooey cheesy wonderfulness |
that looks like perfect comfort food, they are lovely and I bet they taste great, everything with cheese always tastes great
ReplyDeleteOh my goodness, do I ever want a bite of this, curled up under blankets...yum! Welcome back, your trip sounds like a blast :)
ReplyDeleteI love your excitement about the Christmas season - I'm feeling really festive too...bring it on! I was watching Hugh FW's veg programme last night and he made something quite similar - nothing says winter like a delicious creamy stuffed squash. Yum.
ReplyDeleteThanks betty, yes everything is better with the edition of cheese and or garlic and or bacon...
ReplyDeleteEmily - thanks for your comment, I think im just going to let it settle for a few weeks, im still getting over "the rat incident"
littleloaf - i know its not cool to be excited about christmas but hey i think its awesome. I actually saw Hugh's veg program about 2 hours after i posted doh! the leeks and creme fraiche looked really good, im going give it a try next time.
i can imagine how great it would be dipping a slice of the bread into that gooey greatness.
ReplyDeleteoh wow - this looks so good.
ReplyDeletelovely photos as always
Since i hate peeling vegetables, the thing i love about this recipe is that the pumpkin just goes straight into the oven. The gooey, cheesy insides sound lovely. Totally with you on the christmas excitement, i love this time of the year.
ReplyDelete