Cream of Pumpkin Soup recipe
Posted by Fiona Nevile in Starters and Soups | 43 comments
This pumpkin has been languishing on the windowsill for the last week. Not waiting to be changed into a coach for one of our min pins but to be transformed into a vicious head to ward off the Halloween daemons. Halloween has become a vast industry in Britain. Party and toy shops bulge with decorations and the means to disguise the most innocent looking toddler into a vampire, witch or the sort of half eaten zombie that would not be welcome at your average convention of ghouls.
The children in the house where I’m working have already bought the basics for October 31st. Occasionally one creeps up behind me as I work and tickles my neck with a plastic scythe, the skull mask that looms behind it is truly disturbing. Danny and I add to this multi million pound industry when we remember that it’s Halloween and rush down to the village shop to stock up on sweets for trick or treat. Danny spends the evening praying that no child will visit and he can eat the sweets.
The best thing about Halloween for us is pumpkin soup. My friend Clare gave me this recipe that she adapted from an old vegetarian cook book Entertaining with Cranks. This is the best pumpkin soup I have ever tasted, so it appeals to vegetarians and hardened carnivores alike. We use the soft parts that have been scooped out from the pumpkin head.
Recipe for Cream of Pumpkin Soup (serves 4-6)
Ingredients:
- 2 lbs/900g of pumpkin (peeled, seeds removed and chopped)
- I large onion (roughly chopped)
- 1 large potato (peeled and chopped)
- 1 large carrot (peeled and chopped)
- 1 stick of celery (chopped and thick strings discarded)
- 1.5 pts/700 ml of vegetable stock or add two tsp of marigold powder to the same amount of water.
- 1 vegetable stock cube
- 1oz/25g of butter
- half pt of cream
- 2 tbl spoons of chopped chives to garnish
- Salt and pepper to taste
Preparation time 25 mins
Cooking time approx. 30 mins
Method:
- Melt the butter in a large heavy bottomed saucepan and add all the vegetables.
- Cook gently for 5 mins, stirring occasionally. Don’t allow the vegetables to brown.
- Pour in the stock and add the stock cube and stir.
- Simmer gently until the vegetables are just cooked (about 20 minutes) and then purée with an electric blender.
- Return the puréed vegetables to the saucepan and season to taste. Add another 1/2 tsp of Marigold if it needs lifting.
- Add the cream and re heat very gently and thin with more stock if necessary.
- Sprinkle with the chopped chives and serve.
Tricks and tips:
- If you plan to freeze this soup do not add the cream until you defrost and serve the soup
- The soup can also be made with butternut squash instead of pumpkin
Update October 2009: We have a brand new pumpkin soup recipe here.
Leave a reply
I’ve just made this soup for lunch. I teamed it up with home made bread with cheese in the middle. It was absolutely delicious. Thanks very much for the recipe.
Hi Damian
Thanks for dropping by. I love pumpkin soup!
Hello Hilary
I love having soup in the fridge and make quite a lot during the winter. In fact I’ve got a pumpkin sitting on the kitchen table waiting to be transformed into soup.
Hi Julie
Great that everyone enjoyed it. Thanks for leaving a comment.
Made this on halloween just the way you described and it went down a storm with the family.. thanks
Made this today and it was great. I don’t make much soup but it was delicious and easy.
any thanks
Thank you for this recipe – prepared this morning,and eaten this afternoon – delicious
Hi
I have just started to carve a pumpkin with my son, we took the lid off and scooped out all of the inside, which appears to just be stringy pumpkin and seeds, can I use the stringy flesh? will it blens into a silky smooth soup?
I imagined it would be like a squash which I could cut into chunks. Thanks for the recipe and your time.
Hi Audrey
If it’s one of those big supersize ones it’s grown for carving rather than taste. Our small supermarket ones had seeds (which can be roasted for snacks) some stringy bits that I did cook and quite a bit of flesh. Our’s turned out fine. But if you look Suky’s comment on https://www.cottagesmallholder.com/pamela%e2%80%99s-perfect-pumpkin-soup-recipe-5368 you will see that it might taste awful.
Thank you Fiona & Kate for your advice.
I think that is a good idea to cook smaller batches daily and then make the final pot on Saturday. I am getting more and more excited about this soup than anything else!! To be honest I don’t like pumpkin at all but after reading all these comments I am hoping to be pleasantly surprised. I am definitely going to do the Nut thing.. Thanks Katie, I have put each finished pumpkin under the Verandha to keep cool but protected, I am sure that will be ok?? Well thanks again, I must go now as I still have 24 pumpkins left to do!! wish me luck! ( Saving the best to last, the only one I managed to grow!!)
ps. I will let you all know how Saturday turns out, what everyone thinks of my soup!!?
Ahhh can’t wait xxx
I’m with Fiona on this- cook,puree,freeze as you go until you get close to the day when fridging would do.
If you are carving the rest of the pumpkins for lanterns you will need to keep them cool too as they will probably get mould after about four days- so keep an eye on them and scrape off mouldy bits daily so they stay good for Saturday.
Hi Ron
Wow 35 pumpkins 🙂
I’ve been trying to work out what’s best for you to do. The only conclusion I’ve come to is to cook and freeze the pumkin flesh until later in the week when the flesh can be stored in a container in the fridge. That would also take a lot of the sweat out of making the soup all in one go as the fleash is quite hard to chop.
If you save the seeds – wash and dry in a warm oven they make great snacks for the party (lightly salted) and could also be sprinkled on the soup.
Hi there,
I have 35 pumpkins that I am working on for a huge party we are having!!
We are carving about 6/8 a night until Sat.
What I would like to know is how can I store the flesh between now and Sat? I want to make your soup recipe for the party, but as I am scooping out the flesh on a daily basis, I don’t know what would be the best way to keep it fresh!??
Please I hope you can help, I am in a right dilemma 🙁
I really would be grateful for any advice, I have never made Pumpkin soup before! let alone this much!!
Cheers Sharon x