Fresh Baked Pumpkin Bread

This year I grew Pumpkin Pie pumpkins and I love them!  They do require quite a bit of space since the vines do travel far and wide, but all these little pumpkins start appearing very early and seem to ripen up earlier than the bigger size pumpkins.  These are recommended for making pumpkin pies and I have yet to make a pie (sometime this week) but the Pumpkin Bread is delicious!  I used the Oster hand blender I received earlier in the year for the first time and this baby is powerful - makes puree in seconds flat!  This is exactly the tool you need for processing your pumpkin and winter squash.

Fresh from the oven!

Below you can see the actual size of the pumpkin pie pumpkin in comparison to the loaf of bread.   They are full of lots of seeds and pumpkin meat.   I roasted the seeds for snacks.

Pumpkin Bread

(I also use Cushaw Squash to replace the fresh pumpkin)

1 cup fresh pumpkin - cooked and pureed

1 3/4 cups flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1 1/2 cups sugar (I like to use less sugar - 1 cup)

2 eggs

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. nutmeg

1/4 tsp. allspice

1/4 cup water

Mix dry ingredients well.  Make a well in the middle of the mixture and add the eggs, oil and water.  Mix well and pour into loaf pan for baking at 350 degrees for 1 hour.

I have several large Cushaw squash and more pumpkins to process and will leave them for a month or so - the pumpkins hopefully will make it until Halloween and decorate the house until then along with the fall decorations.   The ones I have processed I measured out and froze in 1 cup packages for ease of baking later down the road.   Always remember to label your frozen and canned produce; I guarantee in 3-4 months you will not remember what is what!   They advise against canning pumpkin since it is a low acid item and could cause bacteria and illness.