2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
Pumpkin is the largest vegetable that stands out for its ease of cultivation and high yield. In Russia, this melon crop has been cultivated since the 16th century and is highly valued for its gastronomic qualities
Today, the beneficial properties of pumpkin are used in folk and official medicine, dietary and medical nutrition. The use of fruits stimulates digestion, normalizes metabolic processes, cleanses the body of toxins. Promotes increased immunity, improves blood composition, prolongs youth. Pumpkin is useful for the nervous, cardiovascular systems. It has a diuretic, wound healing, antipyretic effect, relieves attacks of toxicosis, restores the functionality of the liver and kidneys. Pumpkin seeds are an effective anthelmintic agent, a raw material for a popular vegetable oil.
Adherents of a healthy lifestyle try to consume this vegetable all year round. There are various secrets of pumpkin harvesting, among which the main rule stands out - the choice of a vegetable. The fruits for processing must be ripe, immaturity negatively affects the quality and taste of the finished dish. We offer you to familiarize yourself with the most popular recipes.
Dried pumpkin
In this form, the product is used for a snack, cooking casseroles, milk porridge, vegetable pilaf, stew. For cooking, it is advisable to choose medium-sized table varieties. When cutting the skin, a thickness of about 0.5 cm should be removed. It can be cut into strips, cubes, slices, but not thicker than 3 cm.
To preserve the natural color, blanching in a salty solution is required (no more than two minutes). Next, cool quickly in cold water and dry on a linen towel. The final stage is the longest - drying in the oven with the door ajar for 5-7 hours. You can use a vegetable dryer. The finished product is stored in a dry room in closed containers for a year.
Pumpkin jam
The most common way of harvesting, in which you can use combinations with fruits, berries and spices. In any case, the base is pumpkin (80% among other additives). The ratio with sugar is 1: 1. For 1 kg of prepared vegetable, two glasses of water are always added.
Preparation: the skinless pulp is cut into cubes (2-3 cm) and dipped in boiling water (4-5 minutes is enough). After removing the remaining water, you can add other ingredients (chokeberry, orange, pears, apples), while maintaining the proportion: 200 g per 1 kg of pumpkin. The prepared mass is poured with hot syrup. After 12 hours, cook in two stages, 30 minutes each, with a two hour break. During the third, final, cooking, you can add cinnamon, vanillin, a few cloves.
Pumpkin powder
A sought-after food supplement with universal application. Manufactured in an industrial way. If desired, you can do it at home. Preparation: remove the seeds, remove the skin, boil for 20 minutes and rub through a fine sieve. Put the resulting mass on a baking sheet covered with wax paper and place in the oven. The temperature is observed + 135 ° С.
After drying, a sweetish yellow powder is obtained, which is added to various dishes, including side dishes, soups, baked goods, and desserts. When warm water is added, it takes the form of puree, which has a wide vitamin and mineral spectrum. It is used to lower cholesterol, restore microflora, and tone the intestines.
Pickled pumpkin
A canned dish, the recipe of which includes the usual ingredients for pickling vegetables (cinnamon, black pepper, cloves, bay leaves). For a liter of filling, you need 80 ml of 9% vinegar, 30 g of salt, 20 g of sugar.
The prepared pumpkin cubes are blanched, placed tightly in jars, and poured with marinade. To give a more interesting taste, you can add dill umbrellas, horseradish root, celery. The recipe provides for sterilization or double pouring with boiling marinade.
Pumpkin and vegetable caviar
Any housewife can prepare a favorite gourmet dish. In addition to pumpkin, you must have tomatoes, asparagus beans, onions, bell peppers, apples. Everything is taken by the kilogram.
Preparation: Peeled vegetables are separately minced in a meat grinder. Tomatoes, pumpkin, salt and sugar are added to the sautéed onions. After 10 minutes, all other ingredients are added and boiled for an hour over moderate heat. 10 minutes before the end, you need to put spices and vinegar. If desired, it can be rolled up using classic sterilization techniques.
Recommended:
The Benefits Of Mountain Ash And Harvesting Fruits
Although mountain ash bears fruit in August-September, berries can be picked much later. At the beginning of autumn, they are cut off for storage in a raw state, and closer to November, when after the first frosts, it loses its taste of bitterness - for the preparation of winter preparations
Harvesting Mushrooms
You need to be especially careful about mushroom harvesting. The golden rule is to collect and consume only those mushrooms that you know and have no doubt about
Sowing Potatoes: Secrets Of Harvesting And Storage
To get a good harvest of potatoes, you need to properly prepare and store the seed. It is the observance of all the nuances and subtleties that guarantees the yield of the "second bread"
Harvesting Rose Hips For Future Use: Harvesting
Everyone knows that rose hips contain a huge amount of vitamin C, so everyone who uses herbs or herbal teas for treatment (and it's just nice to drink tea with the aroma of herbs and berries in winter) needs to stock up on this healthy berry in time
Secrets Of Growing Sweet And Juicy Pumpkin
Many people grow pumpkin - it attracts not only with its benefits, but also because it is very easy to care for it, and it has a way to be stored for a very long time, but the long-awaited fruits are not always juicy and sweet, and this cannot but depress. In fact, it is not so difficult to grow juicy and sweet pumpkins - for this it is enough just not to let the development of this culture take its course, but to follow a few simple rules
