Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

Carving pumpkins has always been one of my favorite childhood memories.  The best part about it is getting to dig out the guts and seeds and make a mess with your parents permission, then they clean it up for you!  The only thing about it is, all the pumpkin seeds go to waste!  I remembered that in preschool I'd had roasted pumpkin seeds and loved them, so I thought I'd try to make them and see how they turn out.

So, this recipe is a compilation of all the recipes I saw, it doesn't have any real measurements, you can just throw the ingredients together, literally.

Ingredients

Pumpkin seeds

Salt

Seasonings (if you want them)

Instructions

1.  Carve a pumpkin.  This is the fun part. :) Make sure to save the seeds in a bowl separate from the rest of the guts.  It's alright if there is some guts in it, you'll get rid of that later.

2.  Rinse the seeds in a colander (strainer) to get the rest of the pumpkiny sludge off of them.

3.  Leave the seeds to sit out overnight on a cookie sheet so they dry out.  I ended up leaving the seeds out for a full 24 hours, mixing them up in the morning before I left the house and actually making them when I got home from school.

4.  Sprinkle salt and any other seasonings you'd like to the seeds.  I added salt and Tastefully Simple's Everyday Seasoning to give it an extra kick.

5.  Bake the seeds at 300 degrees farenheit for 35 minutes.  Stir the seeds after 20 minutes.  I also add a few more sprinkles of the Everyday Seasoning to the seeds once I stirred them.

6.  Let the seeds cool before eating.  Let them cool for at least 24 hours before storing so they don't become soft.

I ended up making about six cups of roasted seeds.  I was carving pumpkins with friends so I got six cups from six pumpkins.  This is a lot more seeds than it sounds like, so they will probably last my family a few weeks. The recipe turned out really well.  It is by no means set in stone, rather it's extremely flexible and can be changed to fit the tastes of almost anyone.  Salted pumpkin seeds isn't the only kind of roasted seeds either, there are also spicy, Italian, and sugary recipes among others.

Hopefully this gives you something to do with your seeds rather than just throw them away, Happy Early Halloween and enjoy!! :)

Rice Krispie Pumpkins

This is a fun recipe that is relatively simple to do.  I completely forgot to take pictures while making this recipe, but if you've ever  made rice krispie treats before, then it's really no different, just orange.

Ingredients

4 tablespoons of butter
1 bag of marshmallows
6 cups of rice crisp cereal

Instructions

Melt the butter over medium heat, then gradually add the marshmallows, stirring constantly.

When completely melted, remove the butter-marshmallow combination from heat and add the food coloring.  Pour the marshmallows over the rice krispies.

Stir the rice krispies to completely cover all of the cereal, if it is too sticky then allow them to cool or add some more cereal.  If it isn't sticky enough, then gradually add more melted marshmallow, but be careful not to add too much.

When the marshmallow-coated rice krispies are cooled enough and easy-ish to shape, form them into pumpkin-shaped balls.  Unwrap the tootsie rolls and put one on top of each pumpkin to represent the stem.

It is probably good to note that these are very sticky and it is easiest to place the 'pumpkins' on wax paper when they are done.  I couldn't find any wax paper and it was extremely hard to get them off the surface I set them on.


These are really fun for kids to make because it is an opportunity for them to get involved in the kitchen and also get their hands dirty.

Happy Early Halloween!! :)

P.S.  This post obviously didn't go up by Friday as planned, but it's up now!!  Also, I should have another recipe going up tonight that isn't exactly Halloween themed, but it's definitely a fall recipe.  Enjoy the rice krispie pumpkins!

Altering Recipes

Often, when you use a new recipe for the first time it doesn't turn out exactly the way it should.  There's is almost always some little tweak that needs to be made to tune the recipe for your specific oven, the various ingredients that may vary by brand, or the recipe could have the wrong ratios between ingredients.

New bakers are typically hesitant to alter a recipe that they have never used before, the most common excuse is that the baker themselves followed the recipe wrong.  While this is the case sometimes, making small changes to recipes can improve a recipe that just doesn't work completely for you.

I frequently make changes to recipes when needed.  For example, when I made the Langues de Chat, I had to change the amounts of butter and flour so the cookies wouldn't flatten out to the thinness of air.

Basically what the moral or theme of this post is that you shouldn't be afraid to make changes to recipes.  It's usually necessary and makes the recipe taste or look better.  Making little changes to recipes will perfect the recipe for your particular situation.

Hopefully this slightly encouraged and/or helped you!