Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

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how to make pumpkin seeds in the oven, kosher salt, olive oil, pumpkin seeds, roasted pumpkin seeds, roasting pumpkin seeds

Do you have a recipe for roasting pumpkin seeds?  I have a feeling you’ve got this mastered already.  Sigh.

This was going to be the year that I finally roasted our pumpkin seeds.

What I mean is, I wasn’t going to store them in a plastic container that got pushed to the back of the refrigerator (right behind a gallon of milk) only to be discovered weeks later.  Yuck.

Nor was I going to make another attempt without trying to uncover the mystery known as roasting/toasting pumpkin seeds into crispy, crunchy perfection.

What was I doing wrong I asked myself?

When I wasn’t burning them, I was under-cooking them and more or less ending up with a dense, chewy dark-colored seed.  Okay, they were burned.

Again, yuck.

I happened upon Simply Recipes and found a technique I hadn’t tried before.

So, because Halloween has clearly ended, though the candy consumption continues, I invite you to bookmark this recipe/technique for next October. You won’t be sorry.

You’ll want to spend some time cleaning the seeds.  That means removing all of the slippery stuff.  As hard as I tried, I could not convince my littles to assist with this part of the recipe.

After they’ve been cleaned, you’ll measure them in a 1/2 cup measure and place the seeds into a medium saucepan.

To the saucepan add 2 cups of water and 1 tbsp of salt for every half cup of pumpkin seeds.  Bring the water to a boil and let simmer for 10 minutes.  Next, remove the saucepan from the heat and drain.

Place the your oven rack into the top position and preheat to 400 degrees.  Using a pastry or bbq brush, coat the bottom of a baking sheet with light olive oil, and then spread the seeds in a single layer (as best as you can) and toss them around just a bit to coat them in the oil.

Here’s what mine looked like just before they went into the 400 degree preheated oven. Right after this, I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.

In my oven, they took about 18 minutes to turn a light golden brown.  Yours could take a little less or a minute or two more depending on the size of your seeds and how your oven is calibrated.

I have to tell you that I really loved these and thought they tasted a little like roasted, salted sunflower seeds.   My head began to spin with ideas for flavoring these with things like rosemary or chili powder.

Oh and a warning, like most salty snacks…they can be quite addictive.

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

To visit the original recipe click here.

Ingredients

fresh pumpkin seeds

kosher salt

1 tbsp light olive oil

Method

Thoroughly clean the seeds and rinse them under cool running water.  After they’ve been cleaned, measure them in a 1/2 cup measure and place the seeds into a medium saucepan.  To the saucepan add 2 cups of water and 1 tbsp of salt for every half cup of pumpkin seeds.  Bring the water to a boil and let simmer for 10 minutes.  Next, remove the saucepan from the heat and drain.

Place about 1 tbsp of the olive oil onto the baking sheet.  Use a bbq or pastry brush to spread the oil around the baking sheet.  Add the drained pumpkin seeds to the oiled pan.  Toss them to coat in the olive oil and then spread the seeds in a single layer.

Roast the seeds in a 400 degree preheated oven on the top rack.  Roasting may take anywhere from 5-20 minutes depending on the size of the seed and the calibration of your oven.   When they are light golden brown, remove them from the oven and let cool.