Dad's Workshop

I shook off my Saturday funk by making a brilliant dinner. The recipe was in the Oregonian but I can never find anything on their website. I found it on another site but the site had pop-up ads so I'm not going to send you there.

Here's the gist of it, it's really easy.

I used one of my pumpkins, I think the one on the far left. Don't use a jack-o-lantern pumpkin or you will be sorry. Those don't taste good. I think Cook's Illustrated did similar recipe with butternut squash.



I chopped it in half and saved all the seeds for the garden. I chopped it into more manageable pieces, peeled and put them in a giant roasting dish. I added some shallots sliced chunkily and some fresh sage leaves. A half handful?

Then I drizzled with olive oil, sprinkled with some salt and freshly ground pepper and roasted it in the oven at 450 degrees. Usually when I roast things it takes much longer than the directions say but this time was right on: 30 minutes. About halfway through I shook the pan around a bit.

At this point, the dish is completely delicious but if you want to take it to the next level. Boil up some pasta and crumble some goat cheese. Mix the roasted pumpkin with the drained pasta and goat cheese. I feel like I'm forgetting something but I think that's it. The recipe said to reserve some pasta water but mine dish didn't seem to need it.

My sweetheart is really easy to cook for and never says anything unkind about anything I make. If it's something he's not thrilled with he'll say something like, "Maybe this weekend we can try something not so lentil oriented."

He was a tad skeptical watching me shovel pumpkin chunks into the pasta and said he was still a little full from lunch and why don't I give him a small serving. HA! He totally went for seconds.