Baked sweet pumpkin in the oven - my grandmother taught me how to cook it so that it’s tastier and healthier than candy

Pumpkin baked in the oven with sugar is my favorite “cure” for the autumn blues. When it’s gray and slush outside, nothing makes you happy, an orange vegetable that has absorbed the last sun instantly lifts your spirits. My grandmother taught me how to make pumpkin sweets. Even as a child, I wrote down a recipe that I have never found tastier and simpler.

Grandma's recipe “Sweet pumpkin wedges”

Since childhood, my grandmother instilled in me a love for pumpkin with her delicious recipes. They are very simple, but contain little secrets.

To prepare baked pumpkin you need to take:

• half or a quarter of a pumpkin (about 700 g);
• 3-4 tbsp. spoons of butter (about 50 g);
• 1 cinnamon stick;
• 5-6 tbsp. spoons of sugar.

I recommend trying baking pumpkin with coconut or cane sugar (brown). This will add sophistication to it and make the taste richer. You can also use regular white sugar or sprinkle some of the pumpkin pieces with one sugar and some with another.

How to cook pumpkin:

1. Cut a piece of vegetable to the desired size. The remaining portion can be stored in the refrigerator in cling film.
2. Cut off the hard skin to reveal the orange flesh. It is convenient to first remove the main part of the peel with a knife, and then clean off the light remaining skin with a vegetable peeler.
3. Cut the piece in half. Remove the core with seeds. You can scoop it out with a spoon.
4. Cut the pulp into pieces or slices 3-5 cm in size and 1-2 cm thick (as you like).
5. Generously grease a baking dish with softened butter. Melt the remaining butter in the microwave or in a water bath.
6. Fill the mold, pour melted butter over the pumpkin, sprinkle sugar on top. Shave the cinnamon stick a little with a knife right above the slices, and then put it in the dish.
7. Bake at 190 degrees for 40 minutes. The finished pumpkin is easily pierced with a fork and separated into fibers. Its pulp becomes juicy, sweet and aromatic.

If you don't want to dirty the pan, you can use a baking sleeve. I love eating baked sweet pumpkin just like that, while watching my favorite TV series. Depending on my mood, I can bake it with apples, mix it with toasted walnut kernels, and top it with honey. Delicious!

Whole pumpkin with sugar in the oven

If you come across a small pumpkin, weighing up to 1.5 kilograms, you can bake it whole. They used to do this in the villages. The vegetable was washed, cleaned inside, cutting off the lid, and sent to the oven. If desired, a filling of rice porridge with dried fruits and nuts was placed inside. Or they stuffed the pumpkin with sour apples and honey. In any case, everything turned out delicious in the Russian oven - it was soaked in the aroma of the oven, mixed with juices, softened until it melted on the lips.

I use a simple recipe for baked pumpkin, ideal for “city” housewives who spend all day at work and physically cannot stand at the stove for hours.

I take the following products:

• round pumpkin weighing 0.7-1.5 kg (can be unsweetened);
• 0.5 cups sugar;
• cinnamon and mint to taste.

How to cook:

1. Wash the skin of the vegetable thoroughly. If it is very dirty, you can use a brush with a pinch of baking soda.
2. Cut a “lid” around the tail.
3. Using a spoon, remove the seeds through the hole.
4. Pour sugar and spices inside.
5. Close the “lid”.
6. Place the pumpkin on a baking sheet in the oven for 45-50 minutes. Baking temperature – 190 degrees.
7. When ready, the skin will be easily pierced with a knife (fork). All that remains is to cut the vegetable into portioned pieces, and you can try the treat.

Advice! When the whole vegetable is baked, a sweet pumpkin syrup is formed inside. It is good to use for soaking cake layers.

Questions and answers

Which pumpkin turns out the sweetest and juiciest in the oven?

The nutmeg pumpkin is considered the sweetest. It is recommended for baking in the oven and desserts. It is usually elongated, relatively small, smells strongly of fruit, has a thinner, more delicate peel and rich orange flesh.

How to remove pumpkin taste and aroma?

If the original smell and taste of the vegetable cause unpleasant sensations, you can neutralize them with orange zest, lemon or cherry juice. To do this, before baking, pumpkin slices are soaked in a small amount of juice for half an hour. The zest is used as follows: 1 tbsp. pour a glass of boiling water over a spoon, leave covered for 10 minutes, filter. Pour the infusion over the pumpkin and let it soak for 10-15 minutes. You can mix the zest with sugar if the variety is unsweetened.

What can you do with uneaten baked pumpkin?

Sweet baked pumpkin can be chopped in a blender and added to the dough for pancakes or cheesecakes. Pies, casseroles and buns are very tasty with it.

Sweet pumpkin slices baked in the oven taste like candy.Moreover, they are much healthier than store-bought sweets made from palm oil and artificial cocoa. Pumpkin normalizes metabolism, helps fight constipation, weakness and bad mood. It is also good for the skin and a beautiful complexion.