As I mentioned yesterday, we recently celebrated Elena’s birthday, for which I made a Pumpkin Cake. This cake was inspired by the beautiful organic “Cinderella” pumpkins I found at my local market. I had been told by another local farmer that these make “the best” pumpkin pies and such. I was so happy with the result! (Always pay attention to the advice of your local farmers!)
Why make your own pumpkin puree when you can buy it canned? Four reasons: Fresher tasting, cheaper, higher quality, more nutritious (canned food has lost a lot of nutrients). If you would rather, I have heard that using squash makes a great substitution.
Too often you hear of people putting some work into making their own pumpkin puree to use in recipes, only to be disappointed when it turns out less than flavorful and watery. Do two things to avoid this from happening. 1-Use the right type of pumpkin. A pie pumpkin (which is a fairly small pumpkin), or a Cinderella pumpkin are good choices. The ones you buy for your kids may have some good pumpkin seeds for you to use, but have far less flavor and too much water for pies and cakes. 2-The second thing to do is to cook your pumpkin in a way that does not promote a watery final product, and to strain off any extra water.
Keeping those two principles in mind, this is how I cooked my pumpkin. I choose to dry roast it, instead of steam it or bake with water surrounding it. I found this an excellent choice because my Cinderella pumpkin released a lot of water! After trying this puree out in some recipes, I can’t wait to make some more for my freezer.
Pumpkin Puree for Pies and other Recipes
1 Cinderella Pumpkin, washed and cut down the middle, and seeded
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Place your seeded and cut pumpkin, cut side down on a baking sheet (you can use two if you need too). 
Poke the skin side with a fork in several places on both pieces. Place in the oven and roast until soft (a fork should go through the skin and flesh with ease once it’s done). I had a fairly large pumpkin, so this took about 1 1/2-2 hours. Length of time will vary according to the size of your pumpkin.
Turn over your pumpkin halves…
…once they are cool enough to handle and scoop out the flesh into a fine sieve set over a bowl.
Very gently turn over and stir to drain some of the excess water out. You may have to do this in batches, as it probably all won’t fit in at once. Once it looks fairly dry and isn’t dripping anymore. Dump into a food processor and process until smooth.
That’s it, folks!
If you end up with still too much water in your puree, you could line your sieve with cheesecloth and drain some more of it out. But I find that with the first draining, I can get it to the perfect texture.
Pumpkin pies, here we come!
*Update: A piano student very kindly gave me a sugar or pie pumpkin that was grown in their garden. I made it up for a few projects and found it very nice (it had a darker color and more pronounced pumpkin taste). Because it was so small, it didn’t take as much time to bake, and it was a bit drier (though this may have been because I got a little distracted and slightly over baked it). I ended up not having to drain it at all, but just added it to a blender with about 1/2 cup of water, and it was perfect!
{ 17 comments… read them below or add one }
I am so glad you mentioned using the Cinderella! We are big pumpkin fans and plan to grow a small patch next year, but I wasn’t sure which type to focus on. I will definitely make sure there is a Cinderella vine or two in it since we primarily use our pumpkins for baking purposes.
By the way, we have used this sort of puree as baby food anytime we’ve had an infant eating solids in autumn. If the infant was older, we even added a slight sprinkling of pumpkin pie seasonings as a treat. This was such an easy way to make pies or cookies for the family and feed the baby all at once!
I love your blog.
What a simple, straightforward recipe, much better than most I’ve seen. Thanks!
I did this with my butternut squash last year – of course with those you have to add water in order to get them to puree! Delish… and btw, there was a big difference between the squash I grew and the ones I bought, in both color and flavor. (I still have enough puree in my freezer for a couple of “pumpkin” pies).
-AnonymousAmy
Thank you for sharing this!! I definitely want to try my hand at it. I love anything pumpkin!! And I love to attempt to make anything homemade! Homemade is always healthier!
His,
Mrs. U
Thanks so much for sharing. I saw this earlier in the week and came back to read it in detail because I need to make a pumpkin cake this weekend.
Thanks for this great tutorial, Kimi! I’m about to turn on the oven and start baking a couple of pumpkins from my garden, to make pumpkin pies for Canadian Thanksgiving tomorrow night. I grew New England Sugar Pie Pumpkins, which are quite small and supposedly make excellent pies. I can’t wait to try it!
Thank you so much for the helpful instructions! I use pumpkin puree all the time as an egg substitute in baking (my toddler has an egg allergy), but I had never attempted to make it on my own before. The results were excellent…I just need to get a bigger food processor!
Hi, I really enjoy your blog and make your Soaked Oatmeal recipe frequently. I did want to mention one thing about canned pumpkin, the heat applied during canning allows for more “bioavailability” of beta-carotene, which makes it more usable for our bodies. Fresh and canned pumpkin are both nutritious but I would say they both have similar and different benefits. Another canned food with great nutrition is canned tomatoes. Our bodies are able to easily aborb the lycopene from them versus fresh tomatoes. Likewise, cooking fresh tomatoes with olive oil allows for greater lycopene absorption than just consuming fresh.
Have a blessed day!
Julie
Just be careful with the plastic lining that is put in cans now (commercial-bought and Ball jars). Most have BPA in them and that leaches into your food. BPA has received a lot of attention the last few years…but who knows what other chemicals lurk in plastics and leak into your food–especially heat processed ones. I know this doesn’t concern everyone and some think it’s safe. I personally do not.
Weck jars are a good alternative to the metal/plastic concerns in food processing. They have a reusable glass lid. I love mine; although, the did not work well canning applesauce this year. Maybe I did something wrong?
Hi,
We just roasted our sugar pie pumpkins yesterday to make pies. They were much drier than your cinderella pics… I didn’t need to strain them at all so I think they just have less moisture to start with.
The hard part for us was actually scooping the pumpkin out. We grew them in our garden from seeds the kids planted. My son was so excited to get the pumpkins and help me prep them for baking. They were so beautiful when we roasted them, but then we had to destroy the beautiful pumpkin shape to scoop out the pumpkin pulp. It was sort of sad….but I think we’ll recover when we eat the pie!
Tina
Pie pumpkins or cheese pumpkins are actually sweeter and smoother, so pureeing in a food processor isn’t always necessary. They do cook up a bit easier in a covered pot in the oven or slow cooker, if you use them again.
We make white bean and bacon (or sausage) stew in the pie pumpkins. Martha Stewart has a recipe. They are amazing.
I’m sorry I am fairly new to this cooking thing, but I’m trying. Obviously I’m suppose to take the seeds out of the pumpkin but normally when I clean a pumpkin out I scrap the walls. When doing this in order to make a pumpkin pie from scratch am I suppose to leave all the extra gunk in the pumpkin just take out the seeds? Don’t scrap the walls of the pumpkin clean?
I scrap the sides of mine down.
This was so easy! The skin will just peel off if you do it while the pumpkin is still warm, no waste…truthfully after de-seeding the pumpkins they went right in the oven. I used a 1950′s strainer to mash the pumpkin through and the outcome was amazing.
I just wanted to add my “me, too.” Sugar pumpkins aren’t very watery to begin with, so they don’t often need straining.
This year at my farmer’s market I found something called a Caribbean pumpkin, which also made perfect pumpkin puree. (It had kind of a beige skin, and the top was a bit more tapered than the bottom.)
It is worth having a can of pumpkin puree around the first time you make your own pumpkin puree so you can compare consistencies. If you haven’t had puree out of a can since last Thanksgiving, you might not remember exactly what the right texture is.
This is super helpful! Thank you for posting…
I’d like to share a tip that I found a long time ago in a Vermont cookbook. If your pumpkin is too watery after processing, heat a large cast iron skillet. Add the pumpkin and stir, until it evaporates down to the consistency you desire. Works great and no messy straining.
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