Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

Carving pumpkins has become a newer tradition for my family, mostly at the insistence of my younger teenage daughter. A couple of years ago, she claimed she wanted to carve a pumpkin and demanded to know why we didn’t do so every year. It was on the same level of expectation as getting a Christmas tree.

Well, we didn’t carve pumpkins because I found it too messy. There’s some Halloween bah-humbug for you! She gave me an incredulous look after my confession, so I understood, starting that year, I needed to get over it.

She was correct, there really wasn’t a reason why we shouldn’t be carving pumpkins. We do all the other family fall activities like apple picking, corn mazing, decorating, trick-or-treating, jumping into leaf piles. We picked out pumpkins every year at a local farm and decorated them. So what’s one more step? LOL

And October 31st through November 2nd is my favorite holiday stretch of the year. I love combining Day of the Dead, Halloween, Samhain, All Saints Day, and All Souls Day. It makes sense to integrate this historic autumn tradition.

During Samhain in the Middle Ages, Celts had bonfires, called Samghnagans, to protect their families from faeries and witches. Samhain is an ancient Celtic tradition to celebrate the end of the harvest and usher in the darker half of the year. During this time, as with the other holidays mentioned above, celebrants believed the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead was at it thinnest. Ancestral spirits, good and bad, could travel between worlds. Celts carved turnips, called jack-o-lanterns, that were embedded with coal and hung from sticks with strings for protection. Please read more about the history of the Jack-O-Lantern!

The Delicious Seeds

Carving pumpkins does yield a delicious snack–the roasted seeds! So yummy to crunch on throughout the day. They’re very satiating as they contain healthy fats and plenty of fiber.

Here’s a quick glance at the nutritional content of 1 ounce of the pumpkin seeds with the hulls still on:

• Calories: 126
• Protein: 5grams
• Fat: 5.5 grams
• Carbohydrates: 15 grams
• Fiber: 5 grams
• Magnesium: 20% of daily value (DV)
• Zinc: 25% DV
• Iron: 7% DV

Fiber helps with healthy digestion and stabilizes blood sugar. Magnesium contributes to heart and bone health and is actually involved in over 300 metabolic processes in the body! Zinc benefits the immune system and helps with inflammation. Iron contributes to the production of hemoglobin, a component of the blood which transports oxygen.

Recipe

My recipe using just butter and salt for roasting my pumpkin seeds was completely eye-balled and guess-timated! Add or subtract what you think is best. Pumpkin seeds are a great canvas for flavors–savory, sweet, salty. The most important part is making sure the seeds are dried before continuing with the seasoning and final roasting. You also want to roast them in a single layer only. These two steps will give them the crunch that you are looking for!

After scraping out the insides of the pumpkins, I washed and cleaned off the extra pulp as best as I could. I had enough seeds to cover two baking trays in a single layer of seeds.

I pre-heated my oven to 300 degrees. I dried them out first by placing them in the oven for about 20 minutes, stirring once or twice.

Then I added melted butter, about 3 tablespoons per tray and sprinkled with salt. I returned the trays of seeds to the oven to continue to roast about another 20 to 25 minutes, until they turned golden brown.

They are sooooo good! My daughter and I munch on them frequently, and they have been making snack appearances in lunch boxes!