Pumpkins are good more for than just carving

I wish I had my own photos for this. Sorry for having a lame text-centric blog.

Black Bean and Pumpkin Soup

2-3 tbs olive oil
1 sugar pumpkin
2 leeks
4 cups chicken stock
1 dried (or fresh) chipotle pepper
3 tbs cilantro
2 15 oz. cans of black beans
salt
pepper
couple shakes of cumin
toasted pumpkin seeds (recipe below)
sour cream

Peel and coarsely chop the pumpkin. Dice the leeks. Add olive oil into a big pot and heat. Toss in pumpkin and leeks and saute for 5-10 minutes. Add chicken stock, chopped cilantro, cumin, and diced chipotle pepper. Raise heat to bring to a boil and then lower the heat and simmer for 30-45 minutes or until pumpkin is soft.

When pumpkin is soft, add about 2/3 of a can of black beans. Use an immersion blender and puree. Use more or less beans until you get your desired thickness. Then add the rest of the beans and simmer until heated through. Add final dashes of salt and pepper.

Serve in a soup bowl and garnish with toasted pumpkin seeds and sour cream.



Toasted Pumpkin Seeds

Preheat oven to 400.
Pull seeds out of pumpkin and wash clean with water.
Add salt to a pot of water and boil seeds for ten minutes.
Remove from brine mixture and lay on a pan.
Coat in olive oil.
Toast until brown (10-15) minutes.