October Pumpkin, Stripped

I am cheating.

On beets.

With pumpkin.

I don't want to give up my lust for the depth of beets, and the stain of what it takes to have them. They are still in my heart, and I had them this weekend with a sublime "La Bouche" Goat cheese from Quebec. But tonight I felt fickle. Like I was betraying my newly beloved beets.

With pumpkin.

Tonight Harrison wanted to carve pumpkins. Bill's away and its just the two of us. So we sharpened our knives with a pocket knife sharpener (see "Shop Talk", July)and plunged in.


I caught my breath in my chest when we opened the first one. It was wet, and fleshy. And smelled of pumpkin carvings of my childhood. But this was different because my mom hadn't done it for me AND different since I wasn't in just such an extreme billable hour rush to get through it, OR skipping it entirely because it wasn't my "Halloween" with Harrison, OR skipping it entirely because of a myriad of other reasons. Tonight, with the sun setting, pumpkin flesh was all mine. I thought fleetingly of the beets, but... can not help myself.

I never realized how gorgeous the seeds are inside a pumpkin when you first take the top off. How they cascade down in a crescendo of both attachment to the past and suspension in the now. How
F R E S H the seeds taste when you pop one in your mouth. It is a burst of October. It is the essence of seeds and wetness and possibility. If this post is unlike my others, pumpkin has obviously turned on the orange in me.

I pulled at the heavier flesh once the seeds were out, trying to loosen it so Harrison could make easier cuts through the Jack-o-lantern face he was trying to make. (I steeled myself at watching my sweet innocent child with a sharp chef's knife, but gave him instruction, and reason why he should protect himself, and information on how to do it, AND exacted a watchful eye for every cut.. whew...) It scooped out like spaghetti squash - stringy and almost melon-like. A bead of water formed at the base.. strings of pumpkin bunched up in my fingers. It was almost as if it needed me, too - begging to be eaten.

A sheet of puff pastry remained in my freezer, and was rolled onto the silpat. The pan, warmed only with butter and a pinch of salt beckoned the pumpkin with its heat.


No nutmeg, clove, cinnamon, or other extraneous lingerie.

No extra anything. Just naked pumpkin.

I just took my first bite and it is sublime. Not crowded over with other flavour, or disguised, or changed.

It makes me wonder about all the extra layers we add onto things. Love. Work. Truth. Pleasure. Food. Sex. Passion. Nature. October. Maybe we just need to strip things down every once in a while, and get back to what is simple. It made me wonder how food would taste if we approached everything like this - with no combinations, with no change to the essence of what a food is? Just taking it exactly as it is.

I am dazzled with the simplicity and timing of the pumpkin tonight. Maybe we'll meet only fleetingly, in October, during the last week. I certainly can't picture having it every week. It's not that kind of dish... I can't picture wanting it in summer, or in the dead of winter. Or in the pink of spring.
Pumpkin is meant for October.

I'm lucky to have simple, yet sublime influences. And, fleetingly in October, to pumpkin;)