Pumpkin Stew Recipe and How-To Guide
Get Ready for Pumpkiny Deliciousness!
This pumpkin stew recipe is perfect for serving on Halloween night, either right before you go out trick-or-treating, or when we're gearing up to keep the spooks and ghouls at bay. However, you'll probably find out that you love it so much that you'll want to make it all throughout the fall season, as long as you can pumpkin to make it with!
I've used a basic stew recipe, that can easily be tweaked depending on what kinds of ingredients you have on hand. Hope you enjoy!
Pumpkin stew is a traditional Halloween meal in my house, along with pumpkin muffins and worms in mud for dessert (not real ones!) The stew has some pumpkin in it, and is also cooked in a pumpkin in the oven for the final half hour. You can save the leftovers from your carved pumpkin to put in the stew (once you peel off the rind), or you can get canned pumpkin from the store.
This stew can be easily scaled to meet your portion needs. Save leftovers in the fridge or freezer.
Note for vegetarians and vegans: it's easy to make this soup vegetarian/vegan if you leave out the meat, and use vegetable broth for the base.
Ingredients
- A large pumpkin that will fit comfortably in your oven
- Your favorite broth
- or water with bouillon (about 4 cups)
- An onion
- 3 carrots
- 3 stalks of celery
- 3 cloves of garlic
- About 2 pounds of root vegetables
- such as turnips
- potatoes
- sweet potatoes
- and rutabagas
- Bay leaves
- salt and pepper for seasoning
- 1 lb ground beef or beef chunks
- or a ham bone (optional)
- 16 oz can of beans
- or beans prepared from dry
- Pumpkin (peeled and cooked
- or from a can; no seasonings)
Instructions
- Cut the lid off the pumpkin. Make the cut as vertical as possible, as the lid might shrink during cooking. Cut a notch for a spoon for serving.
- Clean out the pumpkin. Be careful to keep the walls as thick as possible. Save the seeds for roasting, if you like.
- If you are using a slow cooker, add the broth or water to the slow cooker and start to heat. In this case, you will use a frying pan to cook your meat and veggies. Otherwise, cook the meat and veggies directly in your soup pot and do not add broth yet.
- (Slow Cooker) Fry onions, carrots, celery, and garlic in a frying pan. Brown beef, if using. Add to slow cooker.
- (On Stove) Fry onions, carrots, celery, and garlic in a soup pot. Brown beef (if using) in soup pot or separate pan, if using. Add broth or water.
- Chop and add root vegetables to your pot.
- Season to taste.
- Cook until root vegetables are soft, about an hour on the stove or 4-5 hours in the slow cooker.
- Add beans and pumpkin, and cook until heated.
- Remove stew from pot, and carefully transfer to prepared pumpkin (stew might not all fit in pumpkin). Place pumpkin in a baking dish, in case of leaks. Cook in oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about half an hour.
- Carefully remove pumpkin from oven. Place a spoon in the pumpkin, serve and enjoy!
Here's a Similar Version!
Alternate Serving Methods - Use Small Pumpkins
If you like, you can use several small pumpkins to serve the stew out of, instead of one large pumpkin. You can even give each person a pumpkin instead of a bowl! To use smaller pumpkins, add finished stew and bake as directed above. Watch pumpkins during cooking to prevent burning.
Image source: blurdom on Flickr.
Looking For More Great Pumpkin Recipes? - Check Out This Book!
Don't wait until Halloween to cook with pumpkin! Pumpkins ripen beginning in the early fall, and can keep for a long time into the winter (as long as you don't carve them, of course!)
Pumpkin Stew Serving Suggestions
What should you eat with your pumpkin stew? That's easy - delicious, moist pumpkin muffins! Adding pumpkin to your muffins gives them great taste, great texture, and extra vitamins to boot. Sprinkle on some pumpkin seeds for extra crunch.
Need a pumpkin muffin recipe? Check these out!
- Libby's Pumpkin Muffins
- Ellie Krieger's Pumpkin Muffins
- Maple-Glazed Pumpkin Muffins (to satisfy your sweet tooth!)
If pumpkin muffins aren't your thing, you can also serve with biscuits or crackers. Or Halloween candy!
Looking for a Vegan Version?
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Pumpkin stew, you say?
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