Our CSA, Oakhill Organics offered beautiful Delicata Squash this week, and I took some. I was not quite sure what I was going to do with them until today. This past Summer I stuffed some large zucchini from our garden, with onions, garlic, kale, mushrooms, fresh basil, and white beans. The stuffed Summer squash was so delicious, that I decided to stuff the Winter squash I received. That however, is another post for another day, today’s post is about the winter squash seeds.

As I was scooping out the seeds and pulp, from the Delicata squash cavity, I remembered a conversation I had with a friend a few days ago. She was telling me she absolutely loved roasting and eating pumpkin seeds. I have not had much success in the roasting pumpkin seeds department. I have always found the seeds not crispy enough, too fibrous, too bland, or too burnt. I was really wavering, between worm pile, or roasting for these seeds. I decided to give these seeds a chance to surprise me and come out of the oven delicious, so I opted to try roasting them. I figured, if they did not turn out well, the worms would still get them.

I did not follow a recipe, but just kept the seasoning simple. The first thing I did after I got the squash scooped out, was rinse and separate the seeds from the pulp, in a bowl of warm water. It is a messy squishy job, but was surprisingly simple, quick, and slightly meditative.

I spread the soaking wet seeds out in a single layer on parchment paper, and put them in a 350 degree F. oven to dry out. After I took the dry seeds out of the oven, I sprayed them with extra virgin olive oil, and sprinkled kosher salt and fresh ground pepper on them, and popped them back in the oven to roast.

I kept moving them around the sheet tray every ten minutes as they were roasting so they would be, if all the stars aligned, evenly crispy, and not unevenly burnt.

I am very fortunate, my girls are always up for tasting new foods, so they most often my snack testers. They each ate a small handful of these, and thought they were so yummy and crunchy, they wanted to know what they were. I told them, and they asked for more. It is fun to see them crunching happily at the table, talking about the food they are eating. I really enjoyed these as well. Next time I think I will drizzle some Bragg Aminos on them before I put them in the oven to dry. I will also cut down a bit on the salt, and see how they turn out. I look forward to roasting pumpkin seeds this year using this basic recipe. I am assuming you can use this recipe for other types of winter squash seeds. Give this recipe a try and tell me what you think.

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