Pumpkin Recipes

The month of October is the start of the delivering of different sizes of pumpkins into the metropolis from the farms in Northern and Central Luzon. These orange-fleshed vegetables will be carved into Halloween’s most famous symbol, the jack-o-lantern. Squash will be peeled, cut, and cooked in hundreds of ways. In the 16th century, the Spanish colonizers brought the pumpkin to our shores aboard a galleon. At present, we call them by their Filipinized Spanish term “Kalabasa”. Bicolanos love to cook them with chili and coconut cream while the Ilocanos steam their young leaves, flowers, and stems with bitter gourd (ampalaya) and salted fish and call it "bulanglang". The Tagalogs cook kalabasa sauted with garlic, onions, and tomatoes.
Below are the pumpkin recipes:

Kalabasa French Fries

Cut the pumpkin. Unpeeled into thick sticks. Add a little salt and drain on paper towels. Deep-fry in hot vegetable oil until half-done. Let it cool in a single layer using paper towels or a bond paper. Deep-fry again until crisp on the outside and tender on the inside. Then serve with a sprinkling of coarse salt, black pepper, and paprika. You may serve it with favorite dips.

Crunchy Kalabasa Chips

Cut the pumpkin into disks 1/6 inch thick. Shake it in a bag of seasoned flour. Dip each slice in a beaten egg, then dredge with Japanese Panko bread crumbs and deep-fry. Cook it until light golden. Serve it with a sweetish tempura dip or vinegar.

Faux Munggo Soup

Boil pumpkin then mash its flesh. Saute garlic, onion and tomatoes, then add a shrimp boullion cube, four cups water and three cups cooked mashed pumpkin. Add salt or shrimp bagoong. Serve with two cups of sliced ampalaya, or any kind of green leaves. You may sprinkle bits of fish crackers, chicharon or kropek.

Kalabasa Breads and Muffins

Grated pumpkin is added to any bread or muffin recipe. You may use any recipe for carrot bread and muffins then substitute an equal amount of pumpkin. This food is rich in fiber, beta carotene, and vitamins.

Ukoy

Cut the pumpkin into match sticks. The ratio is 4 cups of pumpkin: 1.5 cup of flour. Add chicken powder, salt, pepper, and one cup small shrimps. Mix lightly. Form small mounds on a tray and deep-fry the mounds. Fry until it turned golden brown on both sides. Serve with tartar sauce or Filipino style chili vinegar with crushed garlic.

Royal Flan

Cut the top of small grown-up pumpkin. Remove the seeds and bake until the flesh can be scooped out. Leave the skin intact to form a bowl. Mash or pulp the cooked flesh. Add eggs, milk, vanilla, and pureed pumpkin to make a custard. Return to the pumpkin shell, bake and serve.

Haleyang Kalabasa

Add two cups of condensed milk, one cup of pure coconut milk, and a few drops of vanilla in six cups of mashed cooked pumpkin flesh. Cook using in a wide low pan in slow heat. Mix constantly until thickened. Keep in tightly covered jars and store in the fridge for a couple of days.

Kalabasa-Que

Slice pumpkin into thick, long sticks. Leave under the sun for an hour to remove moisture. Deep fry and sprinkle brown sugar to create a coating of brown caramel over the pumpkin sticks.

Fake Potato - Replace potatoes or yams recipe with kalabasa.