Give your holiday a nutritious boost and serve this roasted stuffed pumpkin. The traditional Turkey Day stuffing gets a healthy makeover with sprouted grain bread free of fat-loaded butter and turkey stock. Here’s the best part: Our Roasted Stuffed Pumpkin with Gruyère is just as mouthwatering as the unhealthy stuffing you know and love. Delicious and healthy, this dish is sure to steal the show at any holiday table!
Makes 8 servings. Total preparation time: 1 hour and 15 minutes.
Ingredients:
1 pumpkin, about 2 1⁄2 or 3 pounds
Salt and freshly ground pepper
6 slices sprouted grain bread, diced into small chunks ( Or use your favorite gluten free bread)
1 tablespoon olive oil or
2-4 garlic cloves, coarsely chopped
2 tablespoons diced shallots or onions
1 pound sliced mushrooms
4 celery stalks, diced
1⁄4 cup fresh chives or sliced scallions
1 tablespoon minced fresh thyme or 1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 tablespoon cooking sherry or white wine
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup raw cashews puréed with 1 cup water, or
1 1⁄2 cup almond milk creamer
1 pinch freshly grated nutmeg
1 pound Gruyère, Emmenthal or cheddar cheese, diced into 1⁄2-inch chunks
1⁄4 cup water
Directions:
1. Cut a cap out of the top of the pumpkin (think Halloween Jack-o’-lantern). It’s easiest to work your knife around the top of the pumpkin at a 45-degree angle. You want to cut off enough of the top to make it easy for you to work inside the pumpkin. Clear away the seeds and strings from the cap and from inside the pumpkin. Season the inside of the pumpkin generously with salt and pepper and place pumpkin on baking sheet or in a large round pie plate.1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large skillet, heat oil and sauté garlic and shallot for 1 minute. Add mushrooms and 2 tablespoons water, and sauté until mushrooms are slightly cooked. Add celery, thyme, chives and sherry. Sprinkle with salt and sauté until celery is tender, about 7 minutes. Do not let brown. Add another 2 tablespoons of water to keep the vegetables moist and prevent them from browning.
2. Add mixture to bread crumbs in a large bowl and season with pepper. Fold in cheese, nutmeg and puréed raw cashews or soy creamer.
3. Fill pumpkin with stuffing, cover the top of the pumpkin with foil and bake for 2 hours. After 1 hour, remove foil and place pumpkin cap on baking sheet next to pumpkin and bake for the remaining hour. Allow pumpkin to cool for 10 minutes before serving. Garnish with more diced chives and serve, either by spooning out contents or slicing whole pumpkin into 8 pieces.
Per serving: 156 calories, 7g total fat, 1g saturated fat, 36mg cholesterol, 121mg sodium, 679mg potassium, 2g total carbohydrate, 1g dietary fiber, 24g protein
Easy Substitutions
We realize that you may not always have the time to cook meals from scratch, and that a quick and easy substitution may be needed. We always recommend cooking the real thing, but in a pinch you can try this instead:
Buy acorn squash and cut in half. Bake halves in oven at 375 degrees, skin facing up on a prepared baking pan with ¼ cup water. Bake for 40 minutes. Buy frozen sauté of mushroom and combine with cooked quinoa or brown rice. Add diced kale and 1/4 cup shredded parmesan. Fill acorn squash halves and roast under broiler for 5 minutes until browned on top and serve. Enjoy!
Yours in Health & Bliss,
