Can you believe it is October already!? Can someone stop the world because I want to get off!!! How quickly this year has gone by, feels like yesterday when I was planning the summer holidays! Down here is time to plan again. (Start getting warm and cosy my Northern Hemisphere friends) but on the bright side, October means… Halloween! And as always, I bring you a yummy recipe with the king of this month… the Pumpkin and the turnip! (Keep reading to find out why the turnip!)
By Pat Aguilar
But first a little bit of the history of Halloween and let’s start with the name. Halloween is a contraction for “All-hallows Eve” because it is celebrated the evening before All Saints' Day or All Hollows days, a Christian holiday.
This celebration started thanks to our Celtic friends in ancient Britain and Ireland, that celebrated the festival of Samhain, a festival that remarked the beginning of winter, but also was the day that they believed gods and souls were able to come back for a “little visit”.
So, as you might have noticed, this celebration didn’t start in the United States as many people think, but here is where our pumpkin friend comes into the picture. Our English friends would use turnips to carve faces and put a lantern on them to celebrate this day. But when there was a big migration to the US in 1800, they started using pumpkins instead, as it was easy to get access to them and are bigger and softer to carve than turnips. And the trick-or-treat part of this story (which let's face it, it’s kind of the favorite one, who doesn’t like to dress up and eat candy?) started in England. In the Samhain festival, people were supposed to be visited by souls or ghosts, so these days were a bit charged with fear and supernatural episodes. Many years after our friends from Yorkshire start calling this night the “mischief night” where people (particularly children) would dress up in disguises to scare others, knock on neighbors’ doors and make ghostly sounds. So next time someone tells you that this is an “American” story, you can say “nope” and explain where this comes from.
And now, my promise, because we have two kings in this story, an ancient and a modern one, I’ll bring you two recipes to make pancakes. Yes, you read that right, with the pumpkin we are going to make a sweet pancake recipe for breaks (or dessert or any time of the day, because at least in my books, any time is a good time for pancakes) and a savory one made with turnip, a delicious Latkes recipe.
Pumpkin Pancakes
Ingredients
1/4 cup pumpkin cooked and puréed
3 tbsp almond milk
1 tbsp of maple syrup plus extra to serve
1 tbsp vanilla bean extract
1/4 cup coconut flour
1 tsp cinnamon
Pinch of nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
Coconut yogurt to serve
Blueberries to serve
Instructions
1. Place all the dry ingredients together, add wet ingredients and whisk until smooth.
2. Heat the pan, add a little coconut oil and place a blob of pancake mixture in the middle. Cook until the pancake starts to bubble and rise before turning over.
3. Serve with coconut yoghurt and fresh blueberries. Drizzle with extra maple syrup.
Latkes
Ingredients
1 sweet potato peeled and thickly sliced
1 turnip peeled and halved
2 parsnips peeled
1 medium onion peeled and halved
2 tablespoons almond flour
1 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Canola oil
Egg replacement. (Here you have free will. You can use a commercial egg replacement or flax seed or chia seed. Just make sure that the quantity is like 3 eggs. You can also modify and use any binding element that you desire. I normally don’t use any)
Instructions
1. In the bowl of a food processor or using a box grater, shred the sweet potato, turnip, parsnips, and onion. Transfer to a cheesecloth or kitchen towel-lined colander and wring out the moisture over a bowl. Let it sit for about 10 minutes, then drain any excess liquid, leaving any starch that may be left at the bottom of the bowl.
2. Transfer the shredded potato mixture into the bowl and add the flour, binding element (egg replacement), salt, and pepper. Use your hands to mix.
3. Preheat the oven to 175° F and line a shallow dish or baking pan with paper towels. Heat a pan over medium-high heat with about 1/4 cup of oil. Drop about two tablespoons of the mixture into the pan and use a fork to spread it into about 3-inch pancakes. Let it crisp for a few minutes per side and transfer to the prepared baking dish. Sprinkle with a bit of salt if desired.
4. Keep Latkes warm in the oven until serving. But they’re best eaten right away and served with a dollop of sour cream.
Try these recipes and let us know how you go! We always love to hear from you.
Happy All Hollows Eve!!!!
