Pasta with Pumpkin and Fried Sage

And what did I do with what was left of the two pumpkins I used to make the Shrimp in a Pumpkin? I washed the inside, scraped the content, cut into pieces and used some of it to make the recipe below. My friend Julia had made something like this many years ago, one day I did my version and I liked it, so I never asked for the recipe ...

Ingredients:

pasta cooked al dente
3 tablespoons butter
a bunch of fresh sage
2 tablespoons chopped onion
1 cup cooked pumpkin (still firm), cut in 1/2 " cubes
Parmesan cheese shavings

Preparation:

While the pasta is cooking, fry the sage in 2 tablespoons of butter on low heat. It will be done when the butter turns a little dark (do not let it burn) and the sage is crisp. Reserve.
In the same pan where you fried the sage, heat 1 tablespoon of butter, fry the onion until it gets golden. Add the diced pumpkin. Stir and fry for a few minutes.
Serve the pasta with the pumpkin pieces and the fried sage, together with the browned butter (used to fry the sage). Sprinkle some parmesan on top. Serve immediately.

Fresh Sage

Fried Sage

Shrimp in a Pumpkin

Hi. I have a recipe blog in my native language (Portuguese) for almost a year. I live in the U.S. and some people have been asking me to publish the recipes in English. I have to say that I am already so busy maintaining the original site that I barely have time to work on the English version. But here it is, the first one I am proposing for this week, since we are approaching Thanksgiving and everybody wants to see recipes with pumpkin.

It is a very easy recipe, indeed. It's from my country, Brazil. And the good thing is, even if you don't have a pumpkin, you can still make the recipe, it just won't look as nice.

Ingredients:

1 medium sized pumpkin *
1/2 cup olive oil
1 large onion, chopped into tiny squares
6 large tomatoes, chopped, or the same amount of tomatoes taken from a can of tomatoes (preferably Italian) 
2 lb. jumbo shrimp shelled and clean, raw (no tails on)
8 oz. cream cheese
1 tablespoon grated Parmesan cheese
salt and pepper to taste
chopped parsley, to garnish

Preparation:

Pre-heat the oven to 350 ºF.
Wash the pumpkin. Cut a lid out of it, and scrape the seeds out. Brush the outside of the pumpkin with a little olive oil. Put the pumpkin on a baking sheet, take it to the oven for roasting, for approximately 20 minutes. The meat inside should be soft but the pumpkin should still be firm.
In a large saucepan, fry the onion in olive oil. When the onion has a golden color, add chopped tomatoes (and their juices). Cook for about 5-8 minutes. Add the shrimp, stir well and cook for about 5 minutes. Add the cream cheese and mix well. Adjust salt and sprinkle some pepper. Stir once more. Remove and place this mixture into the pumpkin. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and garnish with parsley. Bake for a few minutes.

When serving, scrape chunks of the pumpkin so that they come together with the shrimp cream.

Serve with white rice. 

* If you don't have a whole pumpkin, you can serve it in a baking plate.