It may seem strange, but recipes for pasta in pumpkin sauce pop up often when I’m searching for recipes online. It was always a concept that appealed to me. I like creamy sauces on my pasta, and I like recipes involving pureed vegetables, and sweet potato and pumpkin are certainly among my favorites.
But I’ve tried these recipes, and they always turn out disappointing. They always ended up so bland, that I gave up on the concept for awhile. I kept booking-marking interesting recipes with pumpkin, and pasta recipes inevitably cropped up. Among them, two recipes intrigued me with their additional ingredients. One added sun-dried tomatoes to the pumpkin sauce, another added gorgonzola cheese.
Wary to try another pumpkin pasta only to be disappointed, I put off examining these recipes more closely. But when I recently discovered a can of pumpkin from last Thanksgiving season in my cupboard, I got a zany idea. Why not combine these two recipes to make a pumpkin pasta with sun-dried tomatoes AND gorgonzola. That couldn’t possibly turn out bland, could it?
SARAH’S PUMPKIN PASTA WITH SUN-DRIED TOMATO AND GORGONZOLA
2 slices of bacon, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1-2 teaspoons garlic, minced
1 (15 oz) can of pumpkin (not pie filling, but plain pumpkin)
1-2 cups of chicken stock
1/4 to 1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
1 teaspoon paprika
1/4 teaspoon of dried sage
dash of nutmeg
salt and pepper, to taste
1/2 cup half & half or sour cream
2-4 oz crumbled gorgonzola
pasta, prepared according to package directions
Fry the bacon in a medium large skillet until crisp. Next saute the onions and garlic in the bacon grease until softened. Add the pumpkin, the stock, tomatoes and spices. Simmer on low until heated through. Add the cream and half the gorgonzola and heat through. Serve over pasta. Sprinkle with remaining cheese crumbles.
I didn’t use exact proportions on this recipe, which is why I included ranges of ingredients in so many cases. The gorgonzola, especially, is an ingredient that should be added carefully, as it is a strong flavor. But luckily this combination of strong flavors finally made a pumpkin pasta tasty enough for me to enjoy and want to make again.