ISO: Info for a friend
October 26th, 2012 | 
Author: My friend wants to make her first ever pumpkin pie from a pie pumpkin. When I tried this many years ago, it wasn’t very successful so I never tried it again. She has made many pumpkin pies but not from scratch from a pumpkin. Anyone have any good advice for her? Really hoping it is a succesful endeavor for her. Thanks for your input
Posted in * Recipe Requests
These seem pretty good???
http://www.wikihow.com/Make-Pumpkin-Pie-Straight-from-the-Pumpkin
http://www.pickyourown.org/pdfs/pumpkinpie.pdf
Hi Sherry,
I have 2 pieces of advice for your friend.
1. Do not boil the pumpkin. It is better that the pumpkin is baked so that there is not too much water in the finished product. I think I have posted the directions from “Joy of Cooking”. If you can’t find it, I’ll post it again.
2. You really don’t need to puree the pumpkin once it is scraped from the shell if it is baked long enough. It is soft enough to make a good texture as it is.
Another thing, I would try to use a recipe that has 2 eggs in the filling mixture. This should help hold its shape once cut.
I’m going to check my recipe just to make sure there isn’t anything else.
Good luck to your friend. Oh, BTW, she does know that she needs to use the small “pie” pumkins, right?
Hello again, Sherry,
The instructions for baking the pumpkin are posted in the old archive here at Mimi’s. If you do a search for PUMPKIN PUREE it should be #28 and my pie recipe can be found in that archive also; search PUMPKIN PIE and it should be #41 – E. D. Smith’s pumpkin pie. The one thing I have changed and loved, is that I have substituted ground cloves for the ginger. If your friend doesn’t care for cloves, she can keep it the same.
These are great recipes and I hope your friend will have as much success with them as I have.
WOW! Thank you Marian! I’ll get this info all looked up, put together and get it sent to her right away. This just might inspire me to pick up a pumpkin at the Amish market this morning myself and give it a try! Thanks again!
I usually boil my pumpkin, but I freeze it next for a day or two. Makes peeling off the skin a whole lot easier. After I drop in a blender to puree. Don’t know how baking effects the skin.
I have boiled and baked the pumpkin depending how much time I had and prefer baked. Boiled pumpkin has a lot of liquid and I end up draining it for use in baked goods. My imagination says that it should have less flavor, but pumpkin does not have much to begin with, so who knows. I often add boiled pumpkin to highly seasoned dishes (chili for example) were the amount of moisture does not matter.
Hi! Got a message back from my friend asking me to thank you all. I had copied and pasted all of your replies to send her. Her message yesterday says that her pies turned out great and she is so happy! The credit goes to you folks…a BIG thank you! She is not a total recipe addict like most of us are so her comments weren’t as detailed as we might have been.
I don’t know if she baked or boiled, but she did say there was some moisture on the bottom of the pies. She also mentioned that she had forgotten to add the sugar for the first time ever but discovered it before baking so was able to get it added. LOL!!! Something I would also do these days…she’s almost as old as I am! Very happy for her and her pies and grateful for you help. Thank you again!