By Kate Shatzkin
The Baltimore Sun | Posted: Tuesday, November 11, 2008 12:00 am
This dish goes out to all of you who fear to cut into a pumpkin for anything other than a jack-o-lantern.
Until recently, I was like you. Until a cute little sugar pumpkin arrived, and sat on our counter staring at me for a couple of weeks as I pondered whether to eat it, or put it out as a porch decoration.
I decided on the former when I read that sugar pumpkins are very easy to peel. Unlike their hard-skinned squash cousins, these pumpkins can be shaved with a Y-style vegetable peeler. Easy as, well, pie.
But this is a dinner story, not a pie story .
So I adapted a recipe from Martha Stewart's Everyday Food magazine. I roasted the pumpkin with some shallots and rosemary from our little herb garden in the morning, then tossed the roasted veggies with some rigatoni, a little butter and some parmesan cheese when I got home.
And then I was rejected by both of my children, who want their pumpkin only in a pie.
This recipe is adapted from Everyday Food.
Rigatoni with roasted
pumpkin and Parmesan
Ingredients:
1 medium sugar pumpkin (about 4 pounds), peeled, seeded and cut into 2-inch chunks
4 shallots, peeled and quartered lengthwise
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 cup fresh rosemary leaves
Coarse salt and ground pepper
12 ounces rigatoni
2 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Toss pumpkin, shallots, oil, rosemary and salt and pepper to taste in a large bowl until combined. Spread on a large rimmed baking sheet (use two if the sheet is too crowded). Roast until pumpkin is tender, 30 to 35 minutes. Toss vegetables halfway through, and rotate sheets if necessary.
In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook pasta until al dente. Reserve 1/2 cup of pasta water; drain pasta and return to pot. Add butter, cheese and pasta water; toss until butter has melted. Gently fold in pumpkin mixture and season with salt and pepper. Divide among serving bowls and serve immediately.
Serves 4.