Alright, there's been a lot of pumpkin cooking around here lately. We've finally gotten off our butts and are making an effort to use them up. One of you nice readers was suggesting soup, so the other day, that's what I made.
For recipes I did a bunch of web searching, and then just ended up winging it. I love to look at recipes online (Martha Stewart's recipe site is my usual go-to) but when I'm trying to make something tonight for dinner I am usually short one or two ingredients and can't be bothered to go to the store for something small and obscure.
So for this soup, here is a rough guide line for what to do, but I hesitate to call it a recipe. I sort of learned this technique from "How to Cook without a Book". I don't actually own this book, but someone I once worked for did, and I remember reading the section on soup, and finding it very interesting. Basically, any vegetable plus stock will eventually equal soup. It was kind of a revelation to me at the time to know that I could make soup from anything that I had in the fridge, and did not have to consult an ingredient list.
So for this one, I sauteed an onion, a clove of garlic, and a stalk of celery in a couple of tablespoons of oil. When the onion is translucent, I added four cups of chicken stock, and then stirred in as much cooked pumpkin as looked good. I'm sorry I can't be more specific than that. Basically, I wanted it to be soupy, not stewy. You just have to eyeball it. Then I let that come to a simmer and cook for a little while. I added some rubbed sage, a bit of rosemary, a scant teaspoon of salt, and a generous grinding of pepper. Then I poured in some milk. I think it was milk, though it could also have been half and half. Again, I can't give you a measurement, I just went glug, glug, glug. When I served it I gave it a garnish of a dollop of sour cream, and quick dribble of balsamic vinegar and a sprinkle of brown sugar. The garnish really gives it a little something more, and I love the combo of creamy/sour/sweet. It was pretty good soup. And if you've never cooked like this before, all loosey-goosey no recipe, I recommend trying it. I will fully admit that I am a recipe girl, but I think its important to try it a different way sometimes. I'm getting more relaxed about substitution as I become a more confident cook, which is good, I think.
And now on the the really, really awesome recipe. Pumpkin Cheesecake! For this one I had a recipe that I was referring to, but I changed so many things that I feel ok about posting the recipe here for you, as it is hardly the same thing at all anymore.
Pumpkin Cheesecake
Crust:
1 cup ground gingersnaps
1/2 cup ground graham crackers
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp melted butter.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Using a fork mix these four ingredients in a bowl, and then press into the bottom of an 8.5 inch spring form pan. Put crust into the oven to bake for anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes, and then remove from the oven while you make the filling. (You just want it to harden up and solidify a bit, but not get burnt.)
Filling
2 and a half, 8-ounce packages of cream cheese, room temperature
3/4 of a cup + 1 tbsp granulated sugar
1 cup of cooked pumpkin puree ( I used my fresh stuff, but you could use canned just as well)
2 tbsp whipping cream
3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp of apple pie spice, or pumpkin pie spice, or allspice, whichever you have on hand
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground cloves
2 large eggs, room temperature
Using electric mixer, beat the cream cheese and the sugar until well combined. Remove a scant 1/2 cup of this mixture to a seprerate small bowl to use as the topping later. To the remaining cream cheese and sugar add the pumpkin, the whipping cream, and all the spices. Beat until well combined. The add the eggs one at a time, beating until incorporated.
Pour this filling into the pan, over top of the crust. Bake until it gets a little browned on top. When you shake the pan, the center should just jiggle a little bit, but it should not look runny. This will take anywhere from and hour to an hour and fifteen minutes. Then put the pan on a cooling rack and allow it to rest for at least 10 minutes. Run a thin, sharp knife around the edges of the pan to loosen the cheesecake, but let it cool completely in the pan. Cover tightly with saran wrap and put in the fridge to chill.
Topping
reserved cream cheese/sugar mix
4 tbsp whipping cream
2 tbsp of store bought caramel sauce.
Take the reserved 1/2 cup of cream cheese/sugar mixture and add the whipping cream. Using electric beaters, mix until just combined. Take the cooled cheesecake out of the spring form pan and using an offset spatula spread the topping over it. Drizzle the caramel sauce over top in whatever sort of fancy pattern you desire. I went with a spiral, but you could be much more creative than that if you want.
I don't want to sound like I'm bragging, but this cheesecake was amazing. It had all the rich flavour of a pumpkin pie, but with the nice tanginess of cheesecake. I heartily recommend this. When I made this a week ago, I was still eating sugar, so I enjoyed it very much until the midwife broke the news about my giant, possibly breach baby, at which point I abruptly stopped eating this cheesecake, in an effort not to make the baby any bigger and therefore harder to get out. And there were still three pieces of this cheesecake left! But Hubs, sweet hero that he is, threw himself on this lovely pumpkin flavoured grenade for me, and finished off the cheesecake. What that man does for me. Its beautiful, I tell ya.