Baking Pumpkins!

Well, today was the day to bake our little pumpkins we got from the pumpkin patch. We have baked pumpkins before and put the pumpkin puree in the freezer but today we baked them a little different than we have ever baked them before. Instead of cutting them open, scraping out the seeds and putting them on a baking pan cut side down, we baked them whole. Has anyone ever done this? I recently saw someone do this on their blog and thought  I  really need to try this with our little pumpkins. Here are few pictures on how we did this. We baked a total of six pumpkins today. 13 1/2 cups of pumpkin puree went into the freezer. We are planning on making some of that yummy Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread in a few days. Start by washing your pumpkins really good.

Then, as you can see you will need to poke about 6 holes in each pumpkin. Place them on baking sheets and bake them about one hour in a 350 degree oven. They will look like this when they are fully cooked.

When they cool enough to handle, you can peel the outer layer off or cut them in half and scoop out the seeds and then the yummy cooked pumpkin.

Now with a food processor, puree all of the pumpkin until smooth.

Now package into freezer containers of your choice. I have used freezer containers in the past but opted to use quart-size freezer ziploc bags this time. I freeze 1 cup in each bag. Although you can freeze any amount you want.

Now its ready for the freezer.

Enjoy!

DANA