Thankful for Pumpkin Pie

Thanksgiving is over but that certainly does not mean that Pumpkin Pie season is over.

This year, we celebrated Thanksgiving with friends and instead of turkey, made Fondue Chinoise, a holiday tradition in my husband’s family. This is a meat fondue where you cook individual slices of meat in hot broth and then dip into one of many yummy sauces. Typically Fondue Chinoise is served with veal and pork and the sauces usually involve cream. We changed things up a little by adding chicken, fish and shrimp and making a couple of sauces that I could eat. We had a mediterranean sauce, a South Indian sauce that was essentially coconut chutney, and a homemade mayonnaise with freshly ground black mustard among others. After a three hour feast and plenty of wine, there was still the apple crumble my friend made to look forward to. Did I mention I love thanksgiving!

So the next day, we had planned on eating lightly. However, I had a hankering for pumpkin pie. After some research and finding this pumpkin pie recipe, we gave it a try. It was soft, spicy and just made my day. The fact that the pie didn’t have a crust bothered me slightly but it also meant that it was much less work. It was already quite dark by the time the pie was baked and we just had pie for dinner! And unfortunately it was too dark to get any decent pictures. One of these days, I’ll get around to experimenting with a gluten and dairy free crust that I can eat. In the meantime, I wanted to share this recipe, bad pictures and all, as soon as possible especially with those of you who, like me, have a lot of food allergies. Life is so much better when you can eat pumpkin pie!

Pumpkin pie that I can eat!

 

Yay for pumpkin pie season

Crustless, dairy free, gluten free pumpkin pie

Adapted from gluten free easily’s recipe

• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 can (16 oz) unsweetened pumpkin puree or 1 cup of homemade puree
• 1/4 cup gluten free flour
• 1/3 cup sugar*
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon freshly grated ginger
• 1/2 cup almond milk

Recipe

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease a 9 inch pie dish with oil (or butter if you can eat it). Mix together all the ingredients and pour into the pie dish. Bake for 15 minutes and then reduce the heat to 350 degrees. Bake for another 25-30 minutes or till a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

*I used regular table sugar or sucrose since I can handle it in small quantities. Please note that I don’t like my desserts too sweet and vastly reduced the amount of sugar used. I’ll be reducing the sugar to 1/4 cup the next time I bake this pie. For those on a FODMAP diet, you can try substituting with dextrose or glucose.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Squash Soup, South Indian Style

South Indian squash curry

I posted a squash soup with spicy tahini recipe just last week. And I’m following up with a variation of it. You see,  that soup was inspired by a friend’s post. And while I was making that, my South Indian instincts took over and I had to make another version! You know what they say, you can take the girl out of South India but…

So here’s this ultra simple and awesome dish: Squash Curry. Simple, hearty and healthy! Living with food allergies does not have to be boring!

By the time this posts, I will be in Hawaii on vacation. Thank god for being able to schedule posts as this means I don’t have to take my laptop with me. This will be my first time traveling for more than a couple of days after being diagnosed with all the food issues. Fortunately, we were able to find places to stay with kitchens. So I’ll be cooking in Hawaii and hopefully learning more about its cuisine!

I made this with a mix of one squash and one small pumpkin each. For a sweeter version, use just the delicata squash.

South Indian Style squash and pumpkin curry

serves 3-4

• 2 cups squash / pumpkin puree (cut into slices, brush with olive oil, bake at 425 for 40 minutes and then puree)
• 2 tablespoons ghee (coconut oil or vegetable oil works fine too)
• 15 curry leaves
• 2 dry red chilis
• 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
• 2 green chilis, chopped
• 1 inch piece of ginger cut into thin matchsticks (grated works too)
• 1 teaspoon salt or to taste
• Juice of 1 lime or to taste

Recipe

Heat the ghee or oil in a small saucepan. Sizzle the cumin seeds, curry leaves and red chilis. After 10 seconds, add the ginger and green chilis and saute for another 20 seconds. Remove from heat. This is your tadka or spice seasoning.

Thin out the puree to your desired consistency and warm up in the microwave. I like the consistency of this curry to be thinner than pumpkin soup but not too runny. Mix in the tadka. Add salt and lime juice to taste.

Serve with rice and cucumber.

Tadka for the Squash curry

Squash and pumpkin soup, South Indian style

Simple, hearty and healthy! Living with food allergies does not have to be boring!

 

 

Squash and Pumpkin Soup with Garam Masala Spiced Tahini

spicy tahini squash and pumpkin soup

I’ve been complaining about my food allergies on this blog these last few months! It’s definitely been a challenge to keep cooking traditional Indian dishes at home that I can blog about. With every new addition to my list of food issues, I went through each of these phases: disbelief that you can’t eat that food, despair as to how you’re ever going to do without it, kitchen clean up where I get rid of all the offending ingredients and subsequent trip to the grocery store to stack up on things that I can eat, experimentation with new recipes and finally, finally feeling like it’s not that big a deal any more.

If you’ve been recently diagnosed with food allergies, how are you doing? Wondering what you can cook or eat when you go out? Please reach out and send me a note. I’d love to help if I can. Here’s the list of foods I’m avoiding and I’d be more than happy to fill you in on recipes and substitutions (Fruits and vegetables are listed because I need to follow what’s called a FODMAP diet):

Dairy (with the exception of ghee), all soy products, gluten, lima beans, kidney beans, chickpeas, peanuts, honey, corn syrup, agave, most artificial sugars, most vinegars, coconut, apples, pear, cherries, watermelon, figs, mango, avocado, nectarines, plums, prunes, bananas, cabbage, green beans, onions, shallots, garlic, beetroot, asparagus, artichoke, leek, spring onion, radicchio, chicory, and tomatoes. 

Garam masala roasted squash and pumpkin seeds are the perfect garnish for this fall soup

So you can imagine my excitement when I saw this butternut squash dip recipe my friend Alli had posted! It was seasonal, spicy and different from other pumpkin or squash soups. I had to make a few adjustments of course including leaving out the yogurt. If I could do coconut milk, I would have loved to use that as a replacement.

I had a delicata squash and a small pumpkin at home that needed to get used up. I also had a jar of tahini that I hadn’t done very much with. Alli’s recipe not only inspired me to make a spicy squash/pumpkin soup but I loved the way she combines the butter with tahini and spices. I microwaved tahini, ghee (instead of butter), cinnamon, cayenne and salt together. This on its own is a great dip by the way! But it adds a wonderful depth to the dish that you don’t get with just the typical squash and cream soup.

I remade Alli’s recipe into this dish below (scroll down for the recipe) but came up with another really simple idea for curried squash puree that I will share next week! A hint, it’s made South Indian style.

Happy Autumn!

Roasted pumpkin and delicata squash ready to be pureed

Delicata squash soup with spiced tahini

Ingredients

Adapted from Alli Shircliff’s recipe on her blog An Open Cookbook

Serves 3-4

• 1 delicata squash, sliced, brushed with olive oil and oven roasted for 40 mins at 425*
• 1 small pumpkin, sliced, brushed with olive oil and oven roasted for 40 minutes at 425*
• 2 tablespoons tahini
• 1 teaspoon ginger, grated
• 2 tablespoons ghee
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon powder
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne powder
• 1/2 teaspoon garam masala
• 1/4 teaspoon turmeric
• 1 teaspoon salt

Recipe

Puree the roasted squash and pumpkin in a food processor with some water.Mix the remaining ingredients in a bowl and microwave for 1-2 minutes on medium high power. Fold into the puree. Adjust for salt if necessary. I had to add another 1/2 glass of water to thin out the soup to my desired consistency. I think I could have easily doubled the amount of garam masala.

*Bonus: Rinse and pat dry the seeds from the squash and pumpkin. Toss with olive oil, 2 pinches of salt and garam masala. Roast in the oven (lowered heat to 300) for 10 minutes. Allow to cool down before eating. These roasted seeds are great as a garnish or on their own as a snack. If you like pumpkin beer, I’m sure these will pair really well.

For a Twist on Thanksgiving

All geared up for the big day tomorrow? If you’re like me, then you’re doing the last minute scramble and the to do list is still a mile long. Yikes! For those looking for a vegetarian alternative to the traditional thanksgiving meal or just an interesting take on the classics, there are lots of recipes. Gnaana, an Indian parenting resource, will be publishing my recipe, a fusion of the classic Indian Aloo Gobi with Thanksgiving stuffing, tomorrow.  In the meantime, here are a couple of recipes I published on the blog last thanksgiving (after the photo).

Fall bounty for a vegetarian pumpkin curry

Green Beans South Indian Style

Pumpkin Curry

Happy Gobble Gobble!

Thanksgiving Curry

I miss my dad. He was supposed to be here right about now but his trip got delayed by a few months. With all the changes in his life and mine, we haven’t managed to get together since 2007! I was thinking about the last time we cooked together. And I think it was many many years ago when I lived in Cincinnati. We made a lamb moussaka together from my Mediterranean cookbook. It was my first time cooking with lamb and making moussaka. I forget how it turned out but I remember it was a fun experience!

So though we ( my husband and I) won’t be spending Thanksgiving with family, we’ll be spending it with some of our amazing friends here in Seattle. This post on Thanksgiving curry is for my dad, the friends who shared this meal with us (and who were nice enough to say this was one of the best curries they’ve had), and all the friends with whom we look forward to sharing a meal with soon!

Let’s talk about the curry. And yes, that’s Thanksgiving CURRY! And no, it’s not just curry that you happen to eat over Thanksgiving cause you don’t like Turkey or don’t eat meat. It’s an honest to goodness thanksgiving, fall themed curry. It’s Indianish Thanksgiving food. Or Thanksgivingish Indian food. Well, you get the idea. I’m sure this is not a new concept but is (or was) new to me. So what am I talking about?

Pumpkin curry. Specifically, steamed and mashed pumpkin ‘purée’ added to caramelized onions with garam masala and a few other spices. Oh yeah along with slightly roasted kuri squash and bosc pear. Pear! My new favorite ingredient to add to savory dishes.

This recipe serves 6.

Ingredients

• 1 (~2.5 lbs) sugar pie pumpkin, cut in half, de-seed, slice each half into 4 or 5 pieces, microwave on high for 3 minutes.
• 1/2 can coconut milk
• 1 small squash (I used 1/2 a kuri squash, a delicata would work well too), process same as pumpkin and then dice into 1 inch pieces
• 1 bosc pear, peeled and cubed into 1 inch pieces
• 1 small onion, finely diced
• 2 inch piece of ginger, grated or cut into thin matchsticks
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
• 1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
• 1/2 teaspoon paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon coriander powder
• 2 teaspoons garam masala
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne powder (optional)
• pinch nutmeg (preferably freshly grated)
• 1 teaspoon salt, divided or to taste

Slices of pumpkin, microwaved

Recipe

Peel the skin off the pumpkin (once microwaved, it will peel of easily) and roughly dice. Throw the pieces into a pot and add a cup of water. Heat on medium high till the water boils and then simmer the pot with lid ajar for 10 minutes or till the pumpkin has the consistency of mashed potato. Mix with the coconut milk. Proceed to the next steps while waiting for the pumpkin to cook.

UPDATE – An easier way to puree pumpkin…http://www.ehow.com/how_4498298_puree-sugar-pie-pumpkins.html

Heat oil over medium high heat in a large skillet or work. The oil is hot enough if you throw in a cumin seed and it sizzles.

Add the cumin seeds and allow them to sizzle for just 5 seconds

Add the onion and 1/2 teaspoon salt, stir regularly for 3 minutes

Add the ginger and garlic. Continue to stir regularly for another 4-5 minutes or till onion is golden brown and caramelized

Add the turmeric, paprika, coriander powder, garam masala and cayenne. Mix well.

Add the pieces of squash. Stir to mix with onion and spices. Allow to cook for 3 minutes.

Add the pear. Stir and cook for another 3 minutes.

At this point you will need to add the pumpkin gravy. If your pan is not big enough, transfer the onion/spices/vegetables and the pumpkin gravy into a big enough pot.

Add a pinch of nutmeg

Simmer on low for 15 minutes

Taste for salt

Serve with rice or naan or as a soup.

Notes

To save time, you can use canned pumpkin puree.

I used bosc pears as these are best for baking. Other varieties might also work just fine.

Have leftover squash and coconut milk? I plan to make a coconut squash shake (can you say squash shake quickly without messing it up???) with a bit of milk and pinch of freshly ground cardamom.

So there, here’s your start to Thanksgiving Indian style. Coming soon (tonight?), is a post on green beans made in a simple South Indian style. Wow your guests with something different than the same old green bean casserole.

Interested in making this curry but don’t have all the spices? I’m happy to mail the thanksgiving curry spice blend to the first five commenters to this post. It’s my way of saying thanks for reading the blog. Send me an email to veena (at) veenasmarket (dot) com with your address after you leave your comment. And no, I won’t give your address away, sign you up for spam or anything. I hate that too!

Veena