pin to present: your pick of pumpkin seeds

Are you a pumpkin seed roaster? I think I've maybe done it once before, but while they're tasty, it really doesn't sound all that appealing to do on my own, what with all the touching pumpkin guts stuff involved. Until I saw this roasted pumpkin seeds six ways post on Pinterest, and the flavor varieties sounded so interesting - and our jack o' lantern pumpkins yielded so many seeds - that I had to pick a few pumpkin seed mixes to try!

I'll be honest, I had envisioned Peter and Hendrik to be the ones to de-gut the pumpkins. But when it came down to the wire on getting them done before Halloween, and Peter ended up having a late day at work, I had to roll up my sleeves (literally - one of those pumpkins was quite tall) and get it done. The result of Hendrik's cute pumpkin designs and these yummy crunchy snacks was worth the work in the end though.

It is a bit of work to get the seeds all cleaned up and ready for roasting, but the recipe I followed has some good tips, and definitely some great seasoning ideas. We tried the cinnamon & sugar (yum), salt & pepper (also yum, though I went with a bit less pepper), and sweet & spicy (spicy!). Now that Halloween is done, if you've got some uncarved pumpkins still sitting around, I suggest making use of them this way - even if we're past October, these still seem like they'd be perfect November seasonal food, like maybe put out in little dishes as snacks on Thanksgiving!