Pumpkins for food instead of decoration

Good day my friends! When I was still married and doing the whole fall/Halloween decorating thing as a family it dawned on me how much pumpkin is wasted every year by this tradition. I knew so many people, myself included who purchased food as a decoration every year but other than maybe roasting some of the seeds from the pumpkins let the entirety of it go to waste then proceed to the canned food aisle in the market to purchase pumpkin to make breads and pies with. As I started to simplify my life after my divorce I realized how absurd this is.

seeds I saved for next year's garden

Thus I started growing my own pumpkins in my garden with the help of my kids to both use as decorative displays but then later as a source of food. This is a little window into that process. In this post I will show how I used one portion of the pumpkins I harvested and shared in an earlier post(found here) to make some delicious pumpkin and black bean soup. My daughter is a vegetarian and she likes the soup I make with my pumpkins so I use this pumpkin and black bean soup recipe for those interested so I can share it with her.

For this soup I choose organic and as local ingredients as I can get within reason. I grew the peppers and pumpkins. The garlic was grown and given to me by a friend. The onions were organically grown in this area. The quinoa, beans and spices are organic but are not local, at least not to my knowledge.

The finished product is a very delicious and healthy soup sourced by myself and made with love for me to consume and share with my friends and family.

The above picture is the soup without the black beans and quinoa.

Have a great day and live well friends!