Pumkins!

I can't run so I have to do something to occupy my time, right? I went to my running clinic on Saturday and stuck with my walking until I can do that without pain in my foot. On the way home, I decided to stop and pick up groceries. And there in the middle of the produce department they had cute little pumpkins.

Pumpkin - cleaned and ready to roast

I had to buy one. And then I had to cut out the stem, gut it, slice it in half and roast it.

Yummy roasted pumkin

Why am I doing this? Just last week didn't I say I joined weight watchers?

Well, there's more to li...errr pumpkins than just pumpkin pie. I really just wanted some puree to make pumpkin smoothies for breakfast. So after roasting my pumpkin with a little salt, I pureed it in the blender and then froze it in muffin cups (silicone ones, not paper) for easy use.

I've had two smoothies so far and they're delicious.

1/2 cup frozen pumpkin puree
1 apple (quartered and cored)
1 cup milk
1/2 scoop VegaOne Vanilla Chai (you could probably just replace this with some pumpkin pie spice or apple pie spice, really).
Optional: handful of spinach because: green things

You may find that your blender has trouble with the muffin cup sized pumpkin puree - mine does ok, but it isn't happy about it. So freezing it in smaller sizes or using pumpkin that isn't frozen might be better. Add ice cubes though because warm pumpkin smoothie is probably a little weird. Even if it does taste like pumpkin pie.

Another smoothie secret: want it to have a more milkshake-like texture? Pick up Xanthan Gum. I found it at my local Sobey's, packaged by Bob's Red Mill. Use no more than 1/4 tsp for a smoothie. I usually do about an 1/8 of a tsp.

I decided I need another pumpkin. Or two. We've already used half of the pumpkin we froze. Possibly more if my husband had a pumpkin smoothie this morning.