[ENG] Pumpkin Soup

So, after i made my Korean Pumpkin Porridge, i feel extra challenged & decided to make my own pumpkin soup! I love pumpkin soup and i've been wanting to make this for so long. It's more challenging than the korean pumpkin porridge because i have to make my own stock since i can't find a good store-bought vegetable stock here. After youtube-ing for a simple vegetable stock, i finally found one, and ready to make my first ever pumpkin soup!

This soup isn't that hard to make, but you have to be a little patient, since it takes time to make the stock and roast the pumpkin, but actually all you have to do is wait. Wait for the stock to simmer for about 2 hours, and the pumpkin to be soft for 2 hours in the oven. I also youtubed for the pumpkin soup recipe, and found the recipe from Sorted Food which looks really good.

Original recipe from Sorted Food - Pumpkin Soup & Squash Tempura

Ingredients:

1 large pumpkin/squash (i used 1 medium & 1 small pumpkin)
2 knobs of butter (about 3-4 tbsp) 
2 onion 
3 cloves garlic
fresh sage (i couldn't fine it so i skipped the sage)
2 tsp cumin (i used 1 tsp)
1 tsp nutmeg
250 ml vegetable stock
150 ml double cream

1. Carefully stab around the pumpkin with a knife. Line your baking pan with foil or parchment paper, place your pumpkin and roast them whole at 180 C for about 1 and half hour or until tender. 

I didn't stab around my pumpkins, i just put them whole, it took about 3 hours in the oven at 230 C (because my oven's not working properly -.-).

After one and half hour in the oven, test with a fork to see if your pumpkin is tender, if it's not tender enough, throw them back in the oven for another 1/2 or 1 hour. Get them out of the oven and let it cool until just warm. 

2. Cut the pumpkin in half and scoop out the fibers and the seeds. Then, scoop out all the pumpkin flesh. 

You don't have to throw away all the fibers near the flesh, if it tender enough it'll be smooth when you blend them anyway. The skin is pretty thin so make sure you scoop out the flesh all the way to the skin.

3. You can wash the seeds, dry them, sprinkle with salt & cayenne pepper (i used paprika powder), and roast them back in the oven to get a really nice garnish.

4. Peel and roughly chop the onion & garlic. Heat the butter in a large sauce pan, saute the onion, garlic and some sage for a few minutes before adding the pumpkin flesh, cumin & nutmeg, then season with salt & pepper.

Add in the vegetable stock and simmer for 5 minutes.

5. With a blender/stick blender/food processor, blitz, slowly adding the double cream until completely smooth. Taste for seasoning, add more salt & pepper if needed (i like my pumpkin soup quite sweet so i added some sugar).
Pour the soup back into the pan & keep warm. Serve in a bowl, garnish with a bit of double cream & chopped pumpkin seeds.

I also toasted some sliced baguettes to eat with the soup.

The unedited photos...

i was attempting to make 3 little hearts with the cream but failed -.-"

This pumpkin soup turned out more on the savory side than what i expected, i can really taste the onion, butter & the spices. I don't eat a lot of pumpkin soup, but i kinda used to the pumpkin soup that's quite sweet, with just a little bit of savoriness. So, while this is still taste good, it wasn't really my favorite. It barely tastes sweet (maybe because i used different variety of pumpkin ?),  so i added a good amount of sugar, and even maple syrup.

But if you like savory pumpkin soup, this is the recipe for you. My mom like it really savory, she even complained that the soup tastes too sweet (because i added the sugar),  but for me, that's what i like from a pumpkin soup, the sweet pumpkin flavor, and it wasn't even sweet enough for me. I also find the consistency is kinda too thick for my taste, i prefer it to be more "soupy". Maybe next time i make this, i'll cut down the onion and the spices, and add more water & sugar. 

By the way, this was actually the first time i ever toast pumpkin seeds (the garnish i used was actually store-bought pumpkin seeds), and i found that it's actually more complicated than i expected lol

So, i thought i just need to pop the seeds into the oven for about 15 minutes and they will be toasted and crunchy and good. But it turned out that these seeds have a yellowish outer layer that quite hard and not eatable, so i had to crack that layer to get the eatable part. And if you didn't toast them enough, it'll be pretty hard to crack open the layer. I ended up over-toasted my seeds and the inner part turned out brown instead of green & tasted quite bitter -.- So, if you don't wanna go through all the trouble, you may go ahead and buy some pumpkin seeds from the store ^^ 

The homemade vegetable stock i made...
[ENG] Vegetable Stock