Homemade Pumpkin Puree

Why it burns in a gas oven

This is the part nobody warns you about.

A gas oven heats from a burner underneath. That means strong radiant heat coming up through the base of your tray, plus a fair amount of moisture from the flame itself. An electric fan oven moves hot air around and the heat arrives much more evenly.

So in a gas oven the tray gets far hotter than the air above it, the sugars in the cut face of the pumpkin caramelise, and then they burn. Meanwhile the thickest part of the flesh is still hard. You end up with something scorched on the outside and raw in the middle, which is a horrible thing to do to a pumpkin.

The trick: two trays

Sit your lined baking tray inside a second empty tray of the same size.

That is it. The gap of air between the two trays buffers the heat coming up from the burner, so the base heats at roughly the same rate as everything else. It is the same principle as a double boiler, and it costs nothing.

Three smaller things that help:

Middle shelf, not the bottom one. The lower you go in a gas oven, the closer you are to the flame.

Cut side down. The skin takes the direct heat and the flesh steams underneath, which is gentler and faster than roasting it face up.

A splash of water on the tray. Two or three tablespoons. It turns to steam, keeps the base from running dry, and it is gone by the time the pumpkin is soft.

If your oven is electric and fan assisted you can skip all of this. One tray, middle shelf, and it will be fine.

You do not need to peel it

Do not fight raw pumpkin skin with a peeler.

Roast it with the skin on and cut side down, and when it is soft the flesh lifts away from the skin with a spoon in one piece. It takes a few seconds per half.

How to tell when it is done

A knife into the thickest part, near the stem, with no resistance at all.

Size matters more than the clock here. A small dense pumpkin can be ready in thirty five minutes and a big one can take an hour, so start checking early and do not trust the timer over the knife.

Draining it

Pumpkin holds a lot of water, and how much varies with the variety and how fresh it is.

If your puree looks loose, line a sieve with a clean cloth or a few sheets of kitchen paper, tip the puree in and leave it for twenty minutes or so. What drips through is water. What stays behind is what you want.

Tinned pumpkin is drained much harder than most homemade puree, which is why a recipe written for a tin can come out wet if you swap in your own without draining it first.

Keeping it

In the fridge in a sealed jar for about five days.

In the freezer for about three months. Freeze it in the amounts you actually use rather than one big block, which means an ice cube tray or small tubs. Half a cup is a useful size.

Where to use it

In baking, in soup, stirred into yogurt, or as the base of anything you would otherwise open a tin for.

A spoonful with a little of my homemade pumpkin spice blend is the simplest thing you can do with it.