Sunday 30 October 2016

ROASTED PUMPKIN SEEDS TWO WAYS


Hi lovelies! As tomorrow is Halloween, I thought this would be a fitting post for today, as I'm sure many of you will be carving pumpkins or cooking with pumpkins as all the lovely winter veggies are filling our supermarkets at the mo! When carving your pumpkin, or cooking up a butternut squash though, don't just discard the seeds! I'm all about minimising waste when cooking and this is a fab way to make use of your pumpkin seeds. Bonus, did you know that pumpkin seeds are actually really nutritious? They're a great source of zinc which is great for supporting your immune system, heart healthy magnesium and they're a source of vegan friendly omega 3.


Making tasty roasted pumpkin seeds as a snack is actually super simple, with a bit of experimenting as well, you can really nail the flavours and make them into the perfect winter treat! I did these two ways, but you can of course adapt the flavours however you'd like to. I decided to do one sweet and one savoury recipe. I particularly recommend the sweet ones, but if you'd like to keep your recipe a little healthier, savoury may be best!!

For these recipes you will need:
The seeds from one whole pumpkin.

For the sweet ones:
Ground Cinnamon
Caster Sugar
Vegan Butter (or regular, but of course I encourage 'veganizing' things where you can!)

For the savoury:
Pink Himalayan Salt (again, regular is fine, but it's worth looking into the benefits of Pink Himalayan over table salt)
Paprika
Mixed Herbs
Garlic
Oil (any fairly flavourless kind will do)



First of all, pre-heat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius, then you'll of course want to de-seed your pumpkin! I then put my seeds into a colander and rinsed them off the best I could with cold water. It's best to then try to dry the seeds as much as possible, but it doesn't matter if they still feel a little slippery! Now at this point, you can either divide your seeds into two batches or just leave them all together and choose one flavour.



So, for the savoury ones, I added all my herbs and spices to the bowl along with a dash of oil. I quite like a slightly burnt taste to things like this, so I added all my spices before cooking, but if you prefer to avoid that, it's a good idea to just cook these with the salt and oil to begin with and then toss them in spices after cooking, or for the last minute or two of cooking. Obviously oil isn't the healthiest ingredient and I do avoid it where possible, but this is a treat and still healthier than regular halloween candy, so go for it!

For the sweet, I added a little melted vegan butter and around half the total amount of cinnamon that I wanted and equal amounts of sugar. The exact amounts will depend on how many seeds you have, but for now just use enough to lightly coat the seeds.


After laying out both sets of seeds in a thin layer on (separate!!) trays, place them both in the oven for around 15 minutes. Cooking time seems to vary, so keep an eye on them! If you're adding your spices just before the cooking time is over, remove your savoury seeds and add your garlic, herbs and paprika before placing them back in for another couple of minutes. The savoury seeds will come out dry and be good to go right away. The sweet seeds however will come out quite sticky due to the cinnamon and sugar, don't be fooled into thinking this means they're not done! Even if the seeds look quite pale, give one a try and as long as it's crispy, you're fine. To finish, pop your sweet seeds into a bowl and sprinkle on some more cinnamon and sugar to make them extra sweet and tasty - they are a treat after all!

And that's it! Super easy and seriously tasty and absolutely no waste!

Let me know if you give these a go, I'd love to see what you come up with. You can definitely play around with the spices and flavourings you use, these are just my favourites. What's your favourite autumn snack?

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