Prep Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Makes: 6 litres or so, which is lots, but it freezes quite nicely!
1 pumpkin, peeled and cubed, (preserve the seeds) about 12 cups worth of cubes
1 onion, peeled, and sliced
4 oz. butter
½ cup flour
1 tsp. minced garlic
1tbsp. minced ginger
3 lt. chicken stock
½ lt. orange juice
2 heaping tbsp. chipotle peppers in adobo sauce
4 tbsp. brown sugar
1 cinnamon stick
½ lt. whipping cream

1. Peel and chop your pumpkin, don’t worry too much about perfectly sized cubes, as the soup will be pureed. Just try to make them fairly consistent in size
2. Heat a large sauce or soup pot (6-8 lt.) over medium high heat, add the butter
3. Melt the butter and add the onions, minced garlic and ginger, cook until translucent
4. Add the pumpkin, and allow to cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring periodically
5. Stir in the flour until evenly combined, then quickly add the chicken stock and orange juice

**if you wish to make this gluten free, remove the flour and reduce the amount of stock to 2.5 lt.

6. Add the chipotles, brown sugar, cinnamon stick, and seasoning, allow to simmer until the pumpkin is tender 15-20 minutes
7. Remove the cinnamon stick and puree until smooth with a hand blender, or place in a blender or food processor to puree. Please exercise extreme caution when pureeing hot soup in a blender or food processor, as it can spill over the top when too full and burn you!
8. At this point you want to adjust the balance of flavour to your liking, perhaps more brown sugar if your pumpkin wasn’t naturally that sweet, maybe a little more peppers if you enjoy the spice, etc.
9. Finish the soup with the whipping cream for a real rich creaminess
10. For a real smooth finish, you can pass the soup through a fine china cap, but it isn’t completely necessary

Chai cream
1 cup heavy cream, whipped
¼ tsp. each, nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger
Pinch, cardammon & allspice

1. Whip the whipping cream to stiff peaks, fold in the spices and adjust the seasoning to your liking

Prepare this topping just prior to serving, as it will thicken up if left to sit too long. If you don’t have all of these spices, don’t stress too much, you can simply do a cinnamon, or nutmeg cream, but I really like the complexity of this blend.

Toasted Pumpkin seeds
1 cup pumpkin seeds, as clean as you can get them, then soak in water 1-2 hours
1 tbsp. chilli powder
1 tsp. salt

1. After soaking the pumpkin seeds for 1-2 hours, strain, remove excess flesh from the seeds, and pat very dry
2. Preheat the oven to 250F
3. Toss the pumpkin seeds in the salt and chilli powder, you can substitute Cajun seasoning if you choose
4. Place on a baking sheet and allow to bake dry, this will take 20-30 minutes, check them periodically
5. Allow to cool

Assembly
Pour the soup in a bowl, top with a generous dollop of whipped cream and toasted pumpkin seeds . Enjoy!