I’ve never made pumpkin puree before, but I thought I’d give it a go as I’m planning on using it in my next recipe.

It takes a while to make, but it’s worth it as it’s a really versatile ingredient that can be used in lots of other dishes.

You can also freeze it, so it doesn’t matter if you make too much.

Ingredients

• Pumpkin

How to make it…

Pre-heat the oven to 180°C.

Cut your pumpkin into a few pieces, depending on its size.

As mine was quite large, I only used half of it, and then I had to halve this a couple more times so that the pieces would fit in the oven.

Put the pieces on a baking tray or in a roasting dish and cover with tin foil.

Bake pumpkin in tin foil

Cook in the oven for around one and a half hours, depending on the size of your pumpkin pieces.

Take it out of the oven and leave it under the tin foil for around 10 minutes. Remove the tin foil and allow to cool.

You should notice that the skin is darker once the pumpkin has been cooked.

Remove tin foil and allow to cool

Next, remove the peel and any burned bits.

Cut into one-inch chunks, put into a food processor and blitz until smooth. If like me you only have a hand blender with an attachment, rather than a full-sized food processor, you may find you have to repeat this step two or three times as it won’t all fit into the attachment at once.

The finished product

Finally, pour any excess liquid into the sink, or if you have any, use cheesecloth to drain the excess liquid.

You can use the puree for baking or as an extra ingredient in smoothies.

It will keep in the fridge for a few days or if you freeze it you can keep it for a few months. I recommend freezing it in a few individual bags or boxes so that you don’t have to defrost the whole lot when you may only need a little for your recipe.

I hope you enjoy making this as much as I have!