Pumpkin is a common term for mature winter squash, of which there are many varieties and sizes. They are a hot weather crop and need a long growing season. 

Commercially canned pumpkin puree is usually made from different varieties than those used for jack-o’-lanterns. Pumpkins grown for food in the 1800s were the smaller sized ones.

Did you know a pumpkin is not actually a vegetable, but a fruit? Anything that starts from a flower is botanically a fruit and the pumpkin flower, once pollinated, becomes the pumpkin.

However, fruits and vegetables are usually named according to how they are eaten and so we think of pumpkins as a vegetable.

INFORMATION BELOW FROM 1800s COOKBOOKS

PUMPKIN MUSH
Pour into a clean pot two quarts or more of good milk, and set it over the fire. Have ready some pumpkin stewed very soft and dry, mashed smooth, and pressed in a colander till all the liquid has drained off. Then measure a pint of the stewed pumpkin, mix with it a piece of fresh butter, and a teaspoon of ground ginger. Stir it gradually into the milk as soon as it has come to a boil. Add, by degrees, a pint or more of Indian-meal*, a little at a time, stirring it in very hard, with the mush-stick*. If you find the mush too thin as you proceed, add, in equal portions, more pumpkin and more Indian-meal, till it becomes so thick you can scarcely stir it round. After it is all thoroughly mixed and has boiled well, it will be greatly improved by diminishing the fire a little, or hanging the pot higher up, so as to let it simmer an hour or more. Mush can scarcely be cooked too much. Eat it warm with butter and molasses, or with rich milk. It is very good at luncheon in cold weather.

*Indian meal – corn meal

*mush stick – a long, round stick, flattened at the end you used to stir with, used to prevent lumps in porridge or puddings

PUMPKIN PUDDING
Take a large pumpkin, pare it, and remove the seeds. Cut half of it into thin slices, and boil these gently in water until they are quite soft. Then rub them through a fine sieve with the back of a wooden spoon. Measure the pulp, and with each pint put four ounces of butter and a large nutmeg, grated. Stir the mixture briskly for a minute or two, then add a third of a pint of hot milk and four well-beaten eggs. Pour the pudding into a buttered dish, and bake in a moderate oven for about an hour. Sugar may be added to taste.

PUMPKIN INDIAN PUDDING
Take a pint and a half of cold stewed pumpkin and mix into it a pint and a half of Indian meal, adding a tablespoon of ground ginger. Boil a quart of milk and as soon as you take it from the fire, stir into it a pint of West India molasses. Then add to it gradually the mixture of pumpkin and Indian meal, and stir the whole very hard. It will be much improved by adding the grated yellow rind of a large orange or lemon.

Have ready over the fire a large pot of boiling water. Dip your pudding cloth* into it, shake it out, and spread out the cloth in a broad pan. Dredge it with flour, pour the mixture into it, and tie it fast, leaving about one-third of the space for the pudding to swell.

Boil it three hours or more—four hours will not be too long. Turn it several times while boiling. Replenish the pot as it boils, with hot water from a kettle kept boiling for the purpose. Take up the pudding immediately before it is wanted for table—dip it a moment in cold water, and turn it out into a dish. Eat it with butter and molasses. This pudding requires no eggs in the mixture. The molasses, if West India, will make it sufficiently light. What is left may be tied in a cloth, and re-boiled next day.

*pudding cloth or bag – a large square of cloth usually made of linen or cotton cloth, to hold a pudding securely in a boiling water bath.

PUMPKIN CHIPS
Take what quantity you choose of a good sweet pumpkin, (the butter pumpkin makes the nicest sweetmeats*.) Halve the pumpkin, take out the seeds, and cut it into chips of the size of a dollar. For each pound of the pumpkin to be preserved, allow a pound of fine white sugar, and a gill* of lemon-juice.

Put the chips in a deep dish, and sprinkle sugar thickly on each layer. Pour the lemon-juice over the whole. Let it remain a day—then boil the whole together, with half a pint of water to three pounds of the pumpkin, a tablespoon of powdered ginger tied up in bags, and the peel of the lemons, cut into small pieces.

When the pumpkin becomes tender, pour the whole into a preserving pot. In the course of a week, drain the syrup from the pumpkin, boil it to a rich syrup, and pour it back hot. Then lay out to dry.

*sweetmeats – sweet delicacies made with sugar, fruit, and/or nuts and usually eaten by hand.
*gill or jill – a liquid measurement; four ounces in the U.S. and five ounces in the U.K.

PUMPKIN PARMESAN
Cut a large pumpkin into square pieces and boil them for about a quarter of an hour in salt and water. Take them out, drain them, and put them in a stew-pan with a little butter, salt, and grated nutmeg. Fry them, sprinkle them with a little Parmesan cheese, and bake them for a short time in the oven till the cheese begins to melt, then serve. This is an Italian recipe.

PUMPKIN SOUP
Take half of a moderate-sized pumpkin, pare it, remove the seeds, and cut the pumpkin into thin slices. Put these into a stew-pan with as much water or milk as will cover them. Boil gently until they are reduced to a pulp. Rub this through a fine sieve, mix with it a little salt, a piece of butter the size of an egg, and stir it over the fire until it boils. Thin it with some boiling milk which has been sweetened and flavored with lemon-rind, cinnamon, or orange-flower water. It should be of the consistency of thick cream. Put toasted bread, cut into the size of dice, at the bottom of the soup-tureen. Moisten the bread-dice with a small quantity of the soup liquor. Let them soak a little while, then pour the rest of the soup over them, and serve very hot. 

Or whisk two fresh eggs thoroughly in the tureen, and pour the soup in over them at the last moment. The soup ought to have ceased from boiling for a minute or two before it is poured over the eggs.

Image from Deposit Photos

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