0:08

Hello, and welcome to food Stuff on Annie

0:10

Reeves and I'm Lauren vocal Bum and today

0:13

it's the pumpkin episode. Yes, but

0:15

don't roll your eyes and click away just

0:17

yet. So don't I know, it's pumpkin

0:19

everything, and it's kind of an overdone

0:21

trend at this point, really, but yeah, it's

0:24

pumpkin is really interesting when you think about it, because

0:26

it's a food and a decoration and

0:29

it feels kind of new to me. I mean, does it

0:31

feel new to you apart from now we're

0:33

reaching saturation point? But yeah,

0:35

yeah, aside well, I mean I don't know.

0:38

Yeah, it's it's it's got such a long history.

0:40

It's one of the first cultivated foods.

0:43

Yeah, and we

0:46

just I feel like in the United States we haven't been

0:48

eating it that long and we still

0:50

kind of don't utilize it, kind of go

0:52

back and forth about it. Yeah, there we have

0:55

periods of eating it and then just

0:58

tale decorations. It's really okay.

1:00

So I checked Google trends and the

1:02

search graft for pumpkin is just hilariously

1:05

peaked. Um every October the search is

1:07

spike like one thousand nine.

1:11

That is quite a percent versus

1:13

the rest of the year. Yeah, it's it's nuts. Um,

1:15

we hit peak pumpkin searches. By the way,

1:18

it's never pumpkin search. Searches

1:22

for pumpkin spice, meanwhile, have been trending

1:24

upward since Google started recording

1:26

data in two thousand four, with really

1:29

huge yearly gemps again in October

1:31

starting starting mostly

1:34

um. Also, no one outside of the

1:36

United States and Canada gives a single fig

1:39

about pumpkin spice anything, according to

1:41

Google, So really, yeah, it's

1:43

just a low, steady

1:45

burn trend. Yeah, I like

1:47

the measurement of fig as well. We should

1:49

adopt that. How

1:52

many figs do I give? Three figs?

1:54

Three figs like pumpkin? Yeah, let's

1:57

talk about it. Let's let's do that. NG

2:01

if you're if you're from the United States anyway,

2:03

that the word pumpkin probably evokes a really

2:05

specific image, like a large

2:07

squash that has this hard, smooth

2:10

ribbed, orange colored shell that's harvested

2:12

in the fall, But the term can

2:14

actually refer to this really ridiculous number

2:17

of different species and cultivars

2:19

within that species, cultivars

2:21

being strains that have been bred by humans for

2:23

specific properties. They're all in the genus

2:26

Cucurbita probably

2:28

um, and most are in the species

2:30

Cucurbita peppo, which is

2:32

actually just this tremendously

2:35

huge category a. Technically zucchini

2:37

a k a. Corgette for many of our European

2:39

listeners, is the same species as

2:42

pumpkin. Really same species.

2:45

They don't like anything like Nope.

2:48

Cultivars uh,

2:50

Squash in general are are

2:52

categorized as summer or winter varieties

2:55

based on when they're harvested. The summer

2:57

types, like zucchini, have soft skins

2:59

and offt seeds and are harvested in

3:02

the summer. The winter types tend to have these

3:04

hard kind of gordy skins,

3:06

which are natural preservers um. If

3:08

you keep them in a cool, dark place, they'll hold up

3:10

for at least two months without any kind of intervention.

3:13

And um. The seeds are a little bit harder

3:15

to They should generally be cooked

3:17

in some way before you consume them. Yeah,

3:20

but what is it? What is it? Well,

3:23

pumpkin is a fruit botanically

3:25

speaking, a berry. Actually

3:27

it's like tomatoes. Uh,

3:29

they're they're the ovary of the pumpkin flower

3:32

that has grown large enough to contain, protect

3:34

the growth of and hopefully distribute

3:37

lots of seeds. Uh. These

3:39

flowers and their resulting fruit grow on vines,

3:41

and the fruit gets really big

3:43

if you give them enough resources to do so. The

3:45

biggest on record is from a Belgian grower.

3:48

In his pumpkin

3:50

weighed two thousand, six hundred

3:52

and twenty four pounds a

3:54

k A like one thousands

3:58

a k A just a little it less

4:00

than a Honda Civic. WHOA,

4:03

So you and I both have Honda Civics,

4:05

and I'm just trying to imagine replacing my

4:07

Honda Civic with the weight

4:10

being similar. That is enormous.

4:14

We could certainly both fit with cargo

4:16

room inside of one of these pumpkins. All

4:20

you're worth looking into? Talk

4:22

about Cinderella, right. Pumpkins

4:25

are grown all over the world. By the way, the only

4:28

continent they can't grow on is Antarctica.

4:30

Let I mean, I suppose that indoors in a greenhouse, you

4:32

could probably make it happen. Probably, I guess not

4:35

too much grows in Antarctica

4:37

when you think about it. Um, And they're

4:39

grown for multiple uses, animal

4:41

feed decoration and human

4:44

feed consumption. Yeah,

4:47

they grow during a single season. Seeds

4:49

planted in late spring will mature to full

4:51

fruit by fall. This reminds

4:54

me. I have a friend who angrily threw

4:56

her Jack o'lann once and

5:00

it still has seeds in it, and

5:03

she ended up growing like several

5:05

pumpkins, which I thought it was kind of bizarre

5:08

because I feel like I've thrown pumpkin seeds

5:10

out and nothing's happened. But maybe

5:12

she had the right just had the right conditions for

5:14

the right velocity of throw and

5:16

it just worked out, I guess. And

5:20

uh like we kind of hit on it.

5:22

It's kind of a new trend in the US, but I've

5:25

seen pumpkin and grocery stores and

5:28

in both sweet and savory dishes when traveling,

5:30

especially in Asia and Australia.

5:33

I remember the first time I saw it in a store in

5:35

Australia was just in chunks, like packaged chunks

5:38

um. And you can find small

5:40

hole pumpkins in Japanese savory

5:42

dishes like tempura um

5:45

roasted like any other vegetable in Australia,

5:47

New Zealand as a sweet in India

5:49

and the Middle East, in pastas in Italy.

5:52

In places like China and Kenya, the

5:54

leaves are steamed and eaten

5:57

pumpkin and squash blossoms are very

6:00

popular in Mexico and the southwestern

6:02

US. You find

6:04

it in most parts of it, used every which

6:06

way, from Super Sweet candies and to Molly's.

6:08

I've even heard there's a tour through

6:10

Mexico where you just go and try all

6:13

the different types of pumpkin, all the different color bezos.

6:15

Yes, exactly, that sounds delicious.

6:18

Um. And there's this pumpkin soup. I still

6:20

regret not trying. I was hiking

6:23

in the Andes and crew, but I

6:25

got altitude sickness the

6:27

one day they served pumpkin

6:29

soup, and they served it in the pumpkin

6:32

and I love pumpkin and soup.

6:34

And I was so upset that there

6:37

was no way, no way.

6:40

I was like seeing spots falling

6:43

slowly out of my chair. Now next,

6:45

next time, next time, next time I'm hiking

6:47

in the Andies, I will

6:50

knock get out to sickness.

6:52

Certainly not on pumpkin soup day. Yes, of

6:55

all the days. The

6:58

pumpkin industry is how having a bit of a heyday.

7:00

In the US, pumpkin production

7:03

went from around a seventy five

7:05

million dollar industry in two thousand and one to a

7:08

forty three million dollar one.

7:11

It's quite the jump. And

7:14

most of the pumpkins were buying in the store are

7:16

the big Halloween pumpkins that we think

7:18

of, yes, generally the big orange ones.

7:21

And then the second type you're most

7:23

likely to encounter in a grocery

7:25

store is a processing pumpkin process

7:28

yes, which I believe is so named

7:30

because a majority of them end up in

7:33

processing plants where their flesh is

7:36

processed, canned, and shipped

7:38

to grocery stores as pie filling,

7:41

pipe filling, or the like. So

7:44

that sounds kind of horrifying the

7:46

use of the word flesh generally. Yeah.

7:50

Most pumpkins, candor otherwise in the US also

7:52

come from Illinois. Illinois

7:55

lead the way in US pumpkin production

7:58

with three eighteen million pounds owns.

8:01

Also, the seeds. Pumpkin

8:04

seeds are eating as snacks, roasted

8:06

usually either by themselves or as

8:09

ingredients and stuff like like granola.

8:11

They're also processed into seed oil, which can

8:13

be used in cooking, as a health supplement

8:16

of dubious health property

8:18

um and in beauty products. The global

8:21

pumpkin seed industry is reportedly growing

8:23

fast. For all y'all, investors out there. I

8:25

know there's so many listening, and like, I gotta get

8:27

in on this pumpkin business right now. Uh.

8:30

Pepita's, by the way, are a type of

8:32

pumpkin seed that comes from a particular

8:34

varietal of pumpkin that produces

8:37

seeds that do not have holes. Um

8:39

so, so they're the little green kind of thing that's

8:42

a that's a holeless pumpkin seed. The

8:44

white variety that you'd find in your carving pumpkins

8:47

have the haul on them. That's the whole part. Gap

8:49

um. They're especially popular in Mexico, where

8:51

where cucabita peppo originated

8:54

as both a snack and a recipe ingredient um

8:56

either whole or ground up into

8:58

a nice little paste. I do love

9:00

pumpkin seeds. We have to

9:02

have a sweet recipe and a savory recipe. Very

9:04

good. I've never made a sweet recipe

9:07

work anyway anyway. Yes, Also,

9:10

the canned pumpkin is probably

9:13

mostly not pumpkin. Other squashes

9:16

yeah at least yeah, if

9:18

you look on the back it says, um,

9:21

but a lot of and a lot of instances

9:23

United States canned pumpkin is some

9:26

other kind of winter squash. Yeah, there's usually

9:28

a little bit of pumpkin in there, but mostly not. Grocery

9:30

stores are lying twists again, surprise,

9:33

surprise. So that's

9:35

briefly what pumpkin is. But

9:39

let's talk about the history of pumpkin as

9:41

a food because this is a food show. We're

9:43

we're also going to talk a little bit about the history

9:45

of pumpkins decoration. Well, yeah, I can't

9:48

not talk about it, I mean absolutely,

9:50

But first we're going to take a quick break for

9:52

a word from our sponsor, and

10:03

we're back. Thank you sponsor. So,

10:07

the oldest evidence archaeologists

10:09

have found of pumpkins comes

10:12

from the Wahaka Highlands

10:14

of Mexico, dating back seven thousand,

10:16

five hundred years, pretty

10:18

long time, where they discovered

10:21

the domesticated pumpkin seats. And

10:24

these early pumpkins were most likely

10:26

at smaller and bitterer

10:28

er, but they were really

10:31

durable and they could survive the winter.

10:33

Because of this, they were probably some of the first

10:35

crops consumed in North America,

10:38

and the Native Americans would pound

10:40

strips of pumpkin flat and weave them

10:42

into mats, so not just for food, but

10:45

they would also eat the dry strops for consumption.

10:48

Yeah, pumpkins so interesting supposedly if you

10:50

if you just boiled them, they tasted quite

10:52

pleasant. Yeah, they'd roast

10:54

them. They'd roast chunks of pumpkin over fires,

10:57

bake them, dry them, grind them up

10:59

and use them as flower are very versatile.

11:01

Um Pumpkin seeds were a favorite

11:03

of the Aztecs and the Mayans would cook

11:06

the fruit into sauces, toast and

11:08

grind up the seeds and use the dried

11:10

out empty pumpkins to drink out of

11:12

ours bowls or other storage containers which

11:14

I never considered, but yeah, oh

11:16

of course totally containers shaped

11:18

huge, huge history of cords as containers

11:21

love it. With the advent

11:23

of maze to the region, farmers discovered the

11:25

benefits of the three sisters formation,

11:28

which I never heard of. The three sisters

11:30

here are squash, maze, and beans, and like

11:32

any good sisters, they help

11:34

each other grow some

11:36

their good sisters. The

11:39

beans grow up and along the cornstalks,

11:42

using them like a natural trellis, and

11:44

the bean roots they release

11:46

nitrogen into the soil, which has been official for

11:48

the corn. The pumpkins and or squash

11:51

vines provided shelter for the roots and kept

11:53

the moisture in the soil. It

11:55

sounds like a pretty sweet set up to me. Absolutely.

11:58

When the Spanish or arrived and the

12:01

Yucatan in the native

12:03

people served them a dish

12:05

of corn to tillas and pumpkin sea sauce

12:07

called food for the Lords, it

12:09

sounds pretty good. The Spanish must

12:12

have liked it because they took the seeds back to Spain

12:14

where it's spread and diversified. And

12:16

lots of New World foods took a while to

12:19

catch on, like remember the tomato, But

12:21

the pumpkin was similar enough to squashes

12:23

that already existed in the Old World, but

12:26

kind of had a better flavor, so

12:28

so it caught on pretty much immediately. Yeah,

12:31

they didn't have to wait around popular And

12:34

this is a roundabout the time the word pumpkin

12:36

first appeared. It originates from the Greek

12:38

word meaning large melon. Makes

12:41

sense. In fifteen forty seven,

12:44

the English started using pompignons

12:47

or pomp pillon. I'm saying

12:49

this is the French accent that the English certainly

12:51

didn't use, but it

12:53

didn't appear in written records until sixty

12:56

seven. And that term comes from the

12:58

French. Pompillon is

13:00

yes, the French word for for pumpkin, um,

13:03

and it was around that time that a bunch of European

13:05

recipes for pumpkin custards began

13:07

to appear within the lower classes.

13:09

Anyway, through the seventeen hundreds,

13:12

upper class Europeans referred to pumpkins as

13:14

ordinary, mean, unsubstantial,

13:17

and frequently cultivated by

13:20

the country people who plant them upon

13:22

their dung hills. I'm

13:24

taking this as a personal affront. I

13:27

am very offended, and I can't understand

13:29

why people keep insulting foods.

13:31

I salted of food, been like

13:34

that food is mean, unsubstantial.

13:37

I guess I've gotten kind of mad at like, I

13:39

don't know, maybe something that I couldn't eat if

13:42

it's difficult to peel. Sometimes

13:44

I get frustrated. But that pain

13:47

melon, pain melon, that

13:49

was rough. Yeah, but I mean, I don't

13:51

blame the pain melon. I kind of I

13:53

wouldn't want to get eaten necessarily. Okay,

13:55

well that's fair. Yeah anyway.

13:59

Um. One the Pilgrims started settling

14:01

in North America, they wholeheartedly

14:04

embraced the pumpkin, which the Native

14:06

Americans introduced them too, in

14:08

part due to its hardiness. They

14:11

used it in desserts and side dishes and soups.

14:14

The pumpkin was the star of the first Thanksgiving.

14:17

As evidence about it, sixteen thirty

14:19

three poem entitled New England's

14:22

Annoyances for

14:24

pottage and puddings and custards

14:26

and pies are pumpkins and parsnips

14:28

are common supplies. We have

14:30

pumpkins that morning and pumpkins at noon.

14:33

If it were not for pumpkins, we should be

14:35

undoone,

14:38

which is undone just

14:42

yeah, yeah, I love

14:44

it. Yeah, but they weren't using

14:46

it in a way most of us are

14:48

familiar with the pumpkin. Yes, the

14:51

pumpkin. Yes. What they would do is

14:53

cut off the top, move the seeds,

14:55

and then they'd fill the inside with eggs,

14:57

cream, honey and other spices. Then they

15:00

hearing the whole thing in the hot ashes

15:02

of fire, wait till it was done. I don't

15:04

know how they knew, but all right, and they scoop

15:06

out the inside, including the pumpkin flesh, and serve

15:08

it as sort of the custard, kind

15:11

of an early version of the pumpkin pie

15:13

kind of Yeah, And they wouldn't have had apple

15:15

pie that early, probably a you know, because

15:17

squash can grow in a season, but decent

15:19

cooking apples take years and years. As we

15:22

have discussed before, Yes we have. Early

15:25

New England colonist also used the pumpkin

15:27

for a haircut template. I

15:30

want to know so much about this. They did it to

15:32

make sure they achieved a clean uniform

15:35

cut, which earned which earned

15:37

them the name the nickname pumpkinheads.

15:40

I know, I just don't know how, but

15:43

anyway, I will look into that

15:45

after this um. In

15:47

the sixteen seventies, one of the first

15:49

published pumpkin recipes appeared in John

15:52

Jocelyn's New England Rarities

15:54

discovered. The recipe called

15:56

for cooking down right pumpkin for a day

15:59

and then adding butter and spices. That's

16:01

pretty much it. Yeah simple. The

16:04

Pilgrims were also known to make pumpkin beer by

16:07

fermenting it along with maple

16:09

sugar, hops and per simmons, and

16:11

through the seventeen and eighteen hundreds, pumpkin was

16:13

a relatively common ingredient in beers

16:16

in the pre United

16:18

States. I suppose um due to its

16:20

availability, whereas malt and hops

16:22

were a little bit more rare. Um that there's recipes

16:24

for mashing out pumpkin juice. The same way

16:27

that you would do with apples, then hopping and fermenting

16:29

that juice as you would with a beer. And

16:31

uh for beers that start with

16:34

malt and hops and dried apple and pumpkin plus

16:36

other stuff like rye and birch and other

16:38

flavorings. There's actually a

16:40

later verse of that pumpkin Louding

16:43

poem or pumpkin annoyance poem, like like,

16:45

why are there all of these effing pumpkins everywhere

16:49

that freeds dust lee? If

16:51

Barley be wanting to make into malt, we

16:53

must be contented and think it no fault, for

16:55

we can make liquor to sweeten our lips

16:57

of pumpkins and parsnips and walnut treat

17:00

ups liquor

17:02

to sweeten our lips. No, I

17:04

have to say, I like this poem. And also pumpkins

17:07

seems to show up in a lot of poems because we were

17:09

talking about some more later fun

17:11

fun thing to look out for. Uh.

17:14

Pumpkin did fall out of prevalence in

17:17

beer here in the Americas until the nineteen

17:19

eighties or so in the craft beer movement. More

17:21

about that in a little bit. Yes, speaking

17:24

of pumpkin pie, what about pumpkin pie.

17:27

Yeah, there were recipes

17:29

for a stud and sweetened pumpkin

17:32

mixture wrapped in pastry all

17:34

the way back to medieval times. Yeah,

17:36

a lot of the recipes you find in medieval European

17:39

cookbooks were modernized in later

17:41

prints by replacing squash with pumpkin, because,

17:43

as Lauren said earlier, when pumpkin

17:45

came around, it was kind of a just seine as a

17:47

tastier replacement for squash.

17:49

Yeah. In sixteenth and seventeenth

17:51

century England, some of them more well off.

17:54

We're familiar with the type of pumpkin pie

17:56

that sometimes involved stuffing apples into

17:59

the shell of a pumpkin, so using the pumpkin

18:01

as the coffin in this instance. That

18:04

it went out of fashion in the eighteenth century,

18:07

and of note as the sixteen fifties

18:09

passage by Edward Johnson

18:12

about a sign of progress in New

18:14

England being that people were eating quote

18:17

apples, pears, and quin starts

18:20

instead of their former pumpkin pies.

18:22

So a k they were eating the more civilized

18:26

European non native not that

18:28

mean unsubstantiated pumpkin.

18:31

Yeah, jeez, tough crowd.

18:33

However, the eight hundreds

18:36

is just about the time that the American

18:38

columnist started the trend of serving

18:40

a sweetened pumpkin dish at holiday gatherings

18:44

like Thanksgiving. In sevent Amelia

18:47

Simmons's cookbook American Cookery,

18:49

which I'm pretty sure we mentioned before, had

18:52

a recipe for pumpkin puddings that were

18:54

baked in a crust similar to what we would

18:56

have today. And there's a fun story about a small

18:59

town and Etiquett in eighteen hundreds,

19:01

they postponed to Thanksgiving a week

19:04

to wait out a molasses shortage

19:06

that impacted pumpkin pie.

19:09

It was so important to the meal. They

19:11

were like, hold up, yeah, we're

19:13

gonna have to put this off for a week. Everybody,

19:16

I hope we're all the same page here, because

19:18

I'm not doing Thanksgiving without my pumpkin pie.

19:21

That's blasphemy. I feel the same way.

19:24

I didn't until recently. I actually

19:26

I love pumpkin but I've only kind of been newly

19:28

introduced to it. Anyway, back to

19:30

the pumpkin pie. It even popped up

19:33

during the Civil War. This dessert

19:35

was far more near and dear to the hearts

19:38

of New Englanders, and since many

19:40

of the most outspoken abolitionists were

19:42

from New England. Pumpkin pie would

19:44

feature in some of their writings. Lydia

19:46

Marie Child's two poem about

19:49

Thanksgiving and New England ended with the line

19:51

Hurrah for the pumpkin pie. On

19:54

top of that, Sarah jo Sifa Hale, who

19:57

as we've mentioned before, is considered

19:59

the mother of Thanksgiving and it's one of my favorite

20:02

most bizarre things I ever got to work on for stuff

20:05

Mom never told you are her story segments,

20:07

So go check that out on YouTube if you if

20:09

you're interested, it's hilarious. She included

20:11

a brief mention of pumpkin pie in her eighteen

20:13

twenty seven anti slavery novel

20:15

Northwood Quote. Yet

20:18

the pumpkin pie occupied the most

20:20

distinguished niche

20:24

after Abraham Lincoln designated

20:26

Thanksgiving a national holiday in eighteen sixty

20:29

three due to this lady's her

20:31

campaigning campaign. Um

20:34

uh, and he did that. He gave

20:36

into this letter writing campaign in part as

20:38

an attempt to heal the country

20:41

after the Civil War. Angry Southerners

20:44

saw it as a way for Northerners to impose

20:46

their traditions on them. Yeah,

20:49

I know. With one editorial out of Virginia,

20:51

claiming, quote, this is an annual

20:53

custom of that people heretofore celebrated

20:56

with devout oblations

20:58

to themselves of pumpkin I and roast

21:00

turkey. Disgusting,

21:04

I know, how dare they?

21:07

However, with the

21:09

help of recipes and write ups

21:11

printed in women's magazines, pumpkin pie

21:14

spread throughout the land and became a

21:16

traditional holiday dessert. Its

21:18

status further solidified with the

21:21

nine introduction of Libbies

21:23

Canned pumpkin, which made pumpkin pie

21:25

baking all the easier. And

21:28

by the way, Libbies currently

21:30

dominates the canned pumpkin market North America

21:33

over nine. Wow, pumpkin

21:36

monopoly. Quite a corner on the market

21:38

there. Yeah, way to go, Libbies. I guess

21:41

I suppose. Okay,

21:45

So let's let's step back a bit and

21:48

look at the other holiday pumpkins

21:50

are associated with Halloween.

21:53

It's my favorite Holida to the

21:56

earliest jack O lanterns come

21:58

to us courtesy of the Scottish and Irish, who

22:00

originally carved turnips and potatoes.

22:04

The English might have used beats man.

22:07

Then they would put hot coals

22:09

inside these root vegetables, but

22:12

it sounds kind of difficult. Yeah,

22:14

you know, it might be easier literally

22:17

anything, Yeah,

22:19

but not literally anything, but probably

22:21

a pumpkin, probably a big, fat,

22:24

round pumpkin. When European

22:26

immigrants arrived to the colonies, they

22:28

saw the cheaper, more easily sourced,

22:30

and more easily carveable pumpkins, and

22:32

they made the switch. I would

22:34

imagine it didn't take much. The

22:37

first written instance of jack

22:39

o' lantern in the context of a carved

22:41

fruit or vegetable, by the way, was

22:44

in seven and

22:46

the pumpkin association first was

22:48

recorded in eighteen sixty six. And

22:50

etymological note why

22:52

Jack in jack o lantern? Well,

22:55

since or so in England

22:57

and later in the United States, the name

22:59

jack was applied as a generic term for

23:01

any male human person,

23:04

hence Jack of all trades, every man, Jack,

23:07

Jack the ripper, and etcetera.

23:09

So so jack or lantern was just Jack

23:11

of the lantern, like, you know, like the dude with the lantern.

23:14

So yeah, fun

23:17

naming note, okay

23:21

for someone who loves Halloween. I actually

23:23

didn't know the myth,

23:25

the story behind the jack lantern. Yeah,

23:27

so this is super fun. This is really fun

23:30

one to research. Yeah, it's a it's a terrific

23:32

old folk story. Um, and it comes to us from

23:34

the seventeenth century Irish tale

23:36

of Stingy Jack. Yes, stingy

23:39

Jack, So let's

23:41

let's set the mood here. Let's set the scene.

23:45

Jack was a drunk and

23:47

the ultimate manipulator. And

23:49

when Satan, yes that's

23:51

Satan, got wind of this fella,

23:54

he was a bit jealous. He

23:56

wanted to prove he was superior and

23:59

evilness and true to this Jack. So

24:02

one night, when Jack was drunkenly stumbling

24:04

around as he was wont to do, he

24:07

ran into Satan looking to

24:09

collect his soul. Jack

24:12

convinced Satan to allow him one

24:14

last drink. But when the bill comes

24:17

to when don't you know it, but Jack doesn't

24:19

have any money, That's

24:21

where the stingy bit comes in, I'm guessing.

24:24

So he convinced the seemingly

24:26

gullible Satan to turn into

24:29

a silver coin to pay for said

24:31

drink, but instead Jack

24:33

pocketed Satan in his now

24:36

coin form next to

24:38

his handy crucifix in his pocket, so

24:41

Satan couldn't transform back. Jack

24:43

would only set him free after he convinced

24:45

Satan to leave him and his soul

24:47

alone for one or ten, depending

24:50

which story you look at years how

24:53

he had this negotiation with a coin that's

24:56

beyond me. Anyway,

24:58

when Satan aim at the end of their

25:01

agreed upon term, Jack tricked

25:03

Satan again again

25:06

by getting him to climb a tree for a

25:08

piece of fruit that Jack wanted as

25:10

his last meal. And then Jack quickly

25:13

placed a bunch of crucifixes to keep

25:15

Satan up up, stuck in the

25:17

tree like a kitten. I

25:19

know, kind of adorable, and

25:22

I really want more details on that conversation.

25:24

How did he convince him to climb a tree for

25:26

this piece of fruit? Anyway,

25:30

this time Jack bargain with Satan to never

25:33

take his soul to Hades, and what I

25:35

imagine as a hand thrown up type move, Satan

25:38

agreed. Alas, when

25:40

Jack finally drank himself to death years later,

25:43

he was refused entrance into Heaven

25:45

for his deviousness, and as for the

25:47

deal he struck with Satan, he couldn't go to Hades

25:49

either. Satan, still mad

25:51

about how foolish all the trickery had made him

25:53

look, sentenced Jack to wander

25:56

a never ending night with only a litt

25:58

coal as his liked. Jack

26:00

placed the coal in a hollowed out Turnip and

26:03

what about his miserable way for all

26:05

eternity. The Irish gave

26:07

him the name Jack of the Lantern,

26:10

later shortened to Jack a Lantern and

26:13

the tradition of carving root vegetables, and

26:15

later the pumpkin with scary

26:17

faces was meant to frighten stingy

26:19

Jack and other spirits like him away.

26:23

Oh yeah, I hope that

26:25

gets you all ready for October, for

26:28

the Fall. I love that

26:30

story so much and I can't believe I've never heard

26:32

it. It's wonderful. Yeah. Also

26:35

also vaguely related to Halloween. Um,

26:38

if you ever have the chance to check out Dellas

26:40

Morthos Festival, look for a sweet

26:42

treat called Calabaza. And it's

26:45

a soft, semi candied pumpkin preparation

26:48

that involves unrefined sugar syrup

26:50

and guava and cinnamon. And it's studs

26:52

that the pumpkin fibers soak up all of that flavor.

26:55

Oh that sounds good. I've

26:57

always wanted to check that out. Okay,

27:01

now I'm kind of like spooked out. Here's

27:05

something to kind of bring bring you back, bring you back.

27:08

The Global Pumpkin Growing Competition

27:10

market. Uh huh may have been

27:12

kick started by the World's Fair in Paris

27:14

in nineteen hundred and the showing there

27:17

of a four hundred pound pumpkin specimen.

27:20

It's about a hundred and eighty one wow.

27:24

Well from there, let's

27:27

jump skip to three and the

27:29

home of a large pumpkin cannary,

27:31

E Sears Canning in Circleville,

27:33

Ohio. Each fall

27:36

farmers whose wagons overfloweth

27:38

with pumpkins, they would make the check to the

27:40

Canary to get their products canned. In

27:43

response, in nineteen o three, the mayor announced

27:45

Circleville would hold an annual autumn

27:47

produce festival, with pumpkin

27:50

in starring role. During the Great

27:52

Depression, E Sears Canning was

27:54

forced to shut her as stores, but the festival

27:56

still continues to this day under the name The

27:59

Pumpkin Show, the largest pumpkin festival

28:01

of its time. There's

28:03

the largest pumpkin contests, largest pumpkin

28:06

pie contest. I want to be involved

28:08

in that so badly, and a miss

28:10

pumpkin pageant. I

28:13

love these like little small festivals. Yea,

28:16

and there are as I'm sure you could get many,

28:18

many, many, many many pumpkin festivals.

28:20

Pumpkin chunkin the Art and Pumpkin Festival

28:23

in California, and there's some amazing,

28:25

just truly stunning Jack o'landard

28:28

displays at a lot of these. I recommend looking

28:30

them up. I want to see one in real life

28:32

so badly. Oh yeah,

28:34

I have a friend she sent me a video of when she

28:36

was out last year. I think she

28:39

was in Salem. Oh man, I

28:41

was so jealous. If you guys have any good

28:43

photographs of that kind of thing, send send them

28:45

on in. Yeah. Um,

28:47

pumpkins is a food Meanwhile,

28:50

we are still a food show. Um in

28:52

the United States anyway, fell out of fashion

28:54

for a bit between World War

28:56

One and World War Two, but picked up again

28:58

with the surge in trigger treating that

29:01

came about during the post World War two era,

29:03

which was that golden age when the streets

29:05

were paved with candy and young baby

29:07

boomers, not literally

29:09

paved. That would be Chris Um.

29:12

There was another bit of a dip in pumpkin

29:14

eating around here from the nineteen seventies

29:17

through the nineties, as the squash was bred

29:19

more for for carve ability than

29:21

for a taste and texture, but another

29:23

trend would bring it back from the ashes.

29:26

Yet again, I wonder what it could

29:28

be. Oh, we'll find out. After another

29:30

quick break for a word from our sponsor, and

29:42

we're back, Thank you sponsor. Okay,

29:46

so it's time to talk about

29:48

pumpkin spice. Pumpkin

29:50

pie spice, pumpkin spice, yes, that whole

29:53

uh pumpkin pie flavor, combination

29:56

of of sweet slash, savory

29:58

squash plus not meg plus them

30:00

in yeah uh

30:02

and I bet a lot of you can guess

30:05

what started this trend. The

30:08

two thousand three release of these Starbucks

30:10

Pumpkin Spice latte those

30:13

PSL's, yes, trending

30:15

on Twitter probably as we speak.

30:19

Between launch and Starbucks

30:21

sold two hundred million

30:24

pumpkin spice lattes and that that was as

30:27

I'm sure it's a lot more these days. Yeah

30:29

uh. And that's extra not bad

30:32

for a product that Starbucks wasn't even sure

30:34

about to begin with, um, given that

30:36

the flavor overpowers that of coffee and is

30:38

more easily reproducible than high

30:41

quality coffee, which ostensibly Starbucks

30:44

wants to be known for primarily you

30:46

would think ostensibly, yes,

30:49

once it caught on, they were like, oh, well that's fine.

30:51

Yeah, okay, we'll just keep

30:53

going with this one. Sales

30:56

of pumpkin spice flavored

30:58

products jumped to

31:01

almost three fifty million dollars

31:04

in the United States. Most of that

31:06

was pumpkin pie filling, but

31:09

Show Bonnie announced that it's limited release

31:11

a pumpkin spy Show Geen was the

31:13

most successful in its history. My

31:15

goodness. And here's a number for you. That's

31:21

the increase of pumpkin as an ingredient in

31:23

beverages since two thousand and six, and

31:25

pumpkin use on ben just

31:28

beverages. And I really

31:30

do think Starbucks is like but

31:33

that was the pinnacle it all

31:35

met at this point. Now

31:38

we're still living with the consequences

31:41

UM, and pumpkin use on menus has risen

31:44

by ten times since two thousand and six.

31:48

A majority of pumpkin spice products sales

31:50

do you take place in the fall s

31:53

falling between

31:55

September and November, and a

31:57

survey conducted in found that thirty

32:00

four percent of the little over one thousand

32:02

of adult participants named pumpkin

32:04

spices the number one flavor they associated with

32:06

fall. That makes sense, sure, uh.

32:09

In the midst of all of this, pumpkin beers

32:11

have enjoyed some serious

32:13

seasonal resurgence. Starting

32:15

in two thousand four, Seattle brewery Elysian

32:18

has hosted a Great Pumpkin Beer Festival

32:21

every September and or October, which

32:23

this year will feature over eighty individual

32:25

pumpkin bruise. Beer Advocate

32:28

dot com great website currently lists

32:30

one thousand, three hundred and ninety nine

32:32

examples of pumpkin ale having been

32:35

professionally produced and sold worldwide. WHOA,

32:39

that's a lot. Yeah, many of them were probably

32:41

like one time offerings, but nonetheless

32:44

like pumpkin and or pumpkin spice

32:47

in general, these beers are divisive.

32:50

Yes. Yeah, many are just super

32:53

sweet and or super spiced

32:55

and can arrange in flavor

32:58

closer to like Yankee candle than

33:00

beer. My current favorite pumpkin

33:02

beer diss comes from the Paste

33:05

magazine review of Southern Tier

33:07

Warlock Imperial Pumpkin Stout, which

33:10

it said tastes like quote

33:12

decades old easy bake oven brownie

33:14

mix rehydrated with black licorice, liqueur

33:17

harsh words. If you have either a

33:19

favorite brand or a favorite diss,

33:22

right and let us know. I love that you have

33:24

a favorite diss. I've read a

33:26

lot of them, I kind of. I'm

33:28

not a fan of pumpkin beer. I have some that

33:30

I like. I I yeah,

33:34

I like very dry flavored alcohols,

33:36

so I do too, and I love

33:38

pumpkin and it is difficult

33:40

to get a pumpkin beer right, but

33:43

I have had a like a handful that I like.

33:45

And I do this thing every Labor

33:47

Day weekend where I get summer beer and

33:50

usually pumpkin beer or fall beer, and I say goodbye

33:52

to summer and hello to fall, even though fall

33:54

doesn't technically start thin. That's

33:57

just my tradition. No, that's lovely. I

33:59

thank you. And here is

34:01

a quick list of some of the weird

34:04

pumpkin items you might encounter in the fall.

34:07

You've got pumpkin spice, marshmallows,

34:09

peeps, pumpkin spice, yogurt, pumpkins

34:12

by sandwich bread, pumpkin spice, popcorn, pumpkins

34:14

spice, chips, pumpkin spice, almonds, pumpkin spice,

34:16

morsels, pumpkins spy, sprinkles, pumpkin spice,

34:18

pok pumpkin spice, white powder,

34:20

pumpkin spice areas, pumpkin spice,

34:22

freada cheeny pumpkin spice gorbonzo

34:25

beans, and it goes on and on. I had to cut

34:27

myself off. I'm sure you guys have seen these

34:29

products. There's an

34:31

astonishing amount of Yeah,

34:34

and then we didn't. I mean, if we go into

34:36

like lotions and perfumes, a whole

34:38

another thing, air fresheners out. Yeah.

34:41

Also, I stumbled a grassa tutorial on

34:43

how to turn a pumpkin into a beer gag.

34:47

Ohh um that that Great Pumpkin Beer Festival

34:49

features a giant pumpkin every year.

34:51

Um from their website ate

34:53

several hundred pound pumpkin that is scooped,

34:56

scorched, filled with Elysian pumpkin

34:58

beer, sealed can, distioned, and then tapped

35:01

at the fest for all to enjoy.

35:04

Okay, now I want to check this out. There are so

35:06

many things I want to see. Field tripped to Seattle.

35:09

Yes. Also, apparently pumpkin

35:11

pie kit cat bars are coming to the United States

35:13

this fall. I might

35:15

try one of those. I've had the pumpkin

35:17

pie resus like

35:20

my two favorite candy

35:23

pumpkin spice. Aside, eating

35:26

pumpkins is actually pretty

35:28

good for you. Um. I mean, you know, before

35:31

you've added crap tons of sugar,

35:33

and cream or butter or whatever into them. Um.

35:36

Pumpkins are high in fiber, they've got a touch of protein,

35:38

and they're low in sugars and fats, which means

35:40

that they are low calorie but super filling. Um.

35:43

They've also got a ton of bated caroteen and are

35:45

good sources of a bunch of other vitamins

35:48

and minerals like like vitamin C and potassium.

35:51

Because of the moisture and pumpkin pumpkin

35:53

puree, it can be used as a as a good substitute

35:55

for cooking fats in baked goods, especially

35:57

quick breads like muffins or banana bread

36:00

things, and you can make your own pure

36:02

if you want. Carving pumpkins, for example,

36:04

are totally edible, but pie pumpkins are

36:06

also widely available in the United States and have a

36:08

nicer flavor slash texture due

36:11

to their fiber content. Pumpkin is also

36:13

really great for controlling both constipation

36:15

and diarrhea. UH. Fiber

36:17

gets the bowels moving and also absorbs excess

36:19

water in the bowels. For that reason,

36:21

it's a popular treatment for digestive problems

36:24

and pets. Just a teaspoon or too mixed in with

36:26

your catadog's food can work wonders. Yeah,

36:29

I did come across that a lot when I was researching

36:31

this episode. There

36:34

you go. Yeah, yeah,

36:35

uh. The seeds are a little less healthy,

36:38

but still a totally decent snack. They're they're high

36:40

and good fats and have a good good

36:43

amount of like high quality proteins. Um.

36:45

The type of the white holes are a better source of fiber

36:47

than pepitas, and this are a little bit more filling. I

36:50

I always clean the seeds from my carving

36:52

pumpkins and roast them, usually just with a

36:54

sprinkle of like vegetable oil and salt. One

36:57

of my favorite things. Huh.

36:59

And as we say earlier, you can also eat

37:01

pumpkin blossoms. Yeah, like zucchini

37:03

blossoms. They're pretty excellent breaded and fried.

37:05

Not so healthy, but that's fine. Um Or

37:07

you can use them the way that you would any other delicate

37:10

green like I think like spinach in a in a super

37:12

a stew. Yeah. I have three

37:15

recipes I go too fairly often with pumpkin

37:18

pumpkin bread. I love um

37:20

pumpkin enchiladdas, pumpkin

37:22

enchiladdos good, and pumpkin

37:25

chili versatile

37:28

it is I'm not goodness okay, okay,

37:31

so that brings us to our culture bit yeah,

37:34

okay. So first pumpkin chicken, Yes,

37:37

punkin chickin Yeah. So in

37:40

six a blacksmith by the name of John

37:42

Ellsworth started what would become the World

37:45

Champion punkin Chicken, an

37:48

annual event in which growers and engineers

37:50

come together to see who can hurl a pumpkin

37:52

the furthest with neither electricity nor

37:54

explosives involved, just the brain

37:57

because we can. Yes. The

38:00

competition claims to be the oldest of its kind,

38:02

and I couldn't find any evidence to the contrary.

38:04

Though the sport has

38:06

spread the United States certainly, and has even

38:08

popped up in Europe. Teams

38:11

build whatever kind of device they want within the

38:13

parameters catapults, ter trebishes,

38:16

or air cannons, and send

38:18

their weight specified pumpkins a fly. In

38:21

the industry standards seems to be eight ten pounds

38:23

per pumpkin. Yeah, I'm glad they've got a standard.

38:25

Yeah. The record distance, according

38:28

to Guinness, is just over five thousand,

38:30

five hundred and forty five feet, which

38:33

is about one thousand six so

38:37

unsubstantial at all. Hey,

38:40

medieval Europeans take

38:42

that, huh. Unfortunately,

38:45

the original World Championship is

38:47

canceled this year due to an injury at last

38:49

year's competition and some pending litigation.

38:53

But we hope that that everyone everyone

38:55

is mentally and physically doing

38:58

better next year and able to come back to

39:00

us. Yes, And

39:03

speaking of competitions giant

39:06

pumpkins, there

39:08

are both regional and global pumpkin

39:11

growing competitions and they are a serious

39:13

obsession for the growers who enter. Careful

39:16

genetic cultivation has grown

39:18

the field explosively in

39:21

the past couple of decades. Just fifteen years

39:23

ago, one thousand pounds was this unheard

39:26

of goal, and now the top

39:28

winners are more than double that. These

39:31

giant pumpkins can grow up to fifty pounds

39:33

per day per day during

39:36

peak growth season. Apparently, the

39:38

secrets, aside from starting

39:40

with like perfectly cultivated seeds,

39:42

are pruning your vines to just a few

39:44

fruits, getting the right amount of sun cover, feeding

39:47

and watering them constantly, using

39:50

friendly fungi to help nutrient transfer

39:53

into the roots, and uh

39:55

protecting their skins from cracks and covering

39:57

them overnight to keep them at the right

40:00

picture, which just sounds so dear.

40:03

Uh. Using using genetics,

40:06

some growers and researchers are hoping to

40:08

push growth even further, and there

40:10

doesn't seem to be an eminent end to

40:13

how big they could get. A paper

40:15

published in the International Journal of Non

40:17

Linear Mechanics estimated

40:20

that giant pumpkins of the proper shape

40:22

could hold up their own weight up to twenty

40:25

thousand pounds a

40:27

k a like nine thousand kilograms. No,

40:30

if I saw twenty pound

40:33

pumpkin, is there a horror

40:35

movie about this? Because if there should be? Oh

40:38

yes, oh, let's write it. Oh,

40:40

I can use that jack lantern myth. Oh it'll

40:42

be so good, uh stingy Jack

40:44

and the twenty pound pumpkin. Oh, it's

40:47

going to be excellent. Look out,

40:49

where are you guys? Yeah? Oh,

40:51

but yeah, yeah yeah. People get so excited

40:53

about this. There's there's a yearly cruise

40:55

for giant pumpkin growers. Um and

40:59

and I I wanted to kind of end this

41:01

our pumpkin episode on a quote from from

41:03

one such grower. There was an article about

41:06

these competitions in Time magazine, and uh.

41:08

One grower by the name of Ron Wallace was quoted

41:11

as saying, have you ever heard anybody

41:13

say a bad word about a pumpkin? No, pumpkins

41:16

could solve the world's problems. Honestly,

41:19

everybody loves a pumpkin. They do. And to

41:21

see one grow that big, my

41:23

heart. It's

41:26

so sweet. It is. Okay,

41:29

I have to say, if I was at a party and

41:32

I overheard someone saying that they grew giant

41:34

pumpkins, it's like a hobby. I'm going to go

41:36

talk to that first. I want to know more

41:39

about you and your hobby. Do

41:42

you think you can reach twenty pounds? You

41:45

know? Yeah, these are important

41:48

party conversation topics. They are um

41:50

and you are welcome for learning

41:53

from us about these party topics.

41:56

Yeah, there's so much we could have impacked in this

41:58

episode. I think the pumpkin spice

42:00

latte alone, Um,

42:04

it's a deep cultural phenomenon. It is

42:06

and over on stuff I never told you.

42:09

We did one kind of about the assumptions

42:11

that come with it, like basic

42:13

thing. Yeah, so maybe

42:16

we'll revisit some of this stuff because there's there's

42:18

a lot surprisingly about

42:22

the pumpkin, about the humble pumpkin. I know

42:26

that brings us to listener

42:28

Male Huzza. Sierra

42:32

sent as this in response

42:35

to our apple pie I

42:37

put recipe, but I'm going to guess I'm

42:39

an episode. Probably yes. I

42:42

recently found an old cookbook at a local

42:45

flea market and it's been full of amazing

42:47

historical revelations and context.

42:50

There's so many dashes of quirk and oddity.

42:53

It's called A Treasury of Great Recipes

42:55

by Mary and Vincent Price. Price.

42:58

Yes, that Vincent Price, and it

43:00

was published in n It

43:03

is all caps. Fascinating. First

43:06

off, who knew that Vincent Price had a cookbook?

43:08

Probably Holley Probably in

43:11

it, he and his wife have collected all

43:13

of the hot cuisine of five

43:16

restaurants from around the world and adapt

43:18

the recipes of the to the American

43:21

kitchen. It's such a great

43:23

look into how food as a spectacle

43:25

and culture has changed in the Western

43:27

world since the sixties. Anyway,

43:30

I found an interesting tidbit describing

43:32

the up and coming hot dog bursting

43:35

onto the scene in American cuisine, and in

43:37

it the Price describes

43:40

it as American as blueberry

43:42

pie. Gasp. It

43:45

made me wonder if blueberry was once the king

43:47

Americana of pies, and if so, when

43:49

the switch to Apple occurred. This may

43:52

not really be the case, but if Vincent Price stated

43:54

it to be, so, it must have been true. Um.

43:57

She also sent us a hilariously

44:00

styled hot dog picture from the book and

44:02

the topic suggestion for aspects which

44:04

I've never heard of and want to cover so badly. Laura

44:07

knows, I went on a kind of a crazy rabbit hole. I

44:09

was just looking at pictures and laughing at my computer. Aspects

44:12

being these savory meat gelatin's

44:15

from uh back

44:17

in the day. They're hilarious looking, They're really

44:19

silly. Uh. Other listener

44:21

male, regarding our tomato episode

44:24

of both Sandra on Facebook and

44:26

lack of Creativity on Instagram, wrote

44:29

in about Lato Matina, a famous

44:31

or infamous, perhaps tomato based food fight

44:34

that happens every Augustine, Spain. Uh,

44:36

We're we're vaguely plotting an episode about food

44:38

fights for some time in the future, so we will have to include

44:41

that one there. And also

44:43

regarding tomatoes, Heather on Instagram

44:45

wrote in Okay, the tomato

44:48

worms. I've seen ones like five

44:50

inches and they are awful. Most

44:52

people don't get them because they spray their plants with pesticides,

44:55

but it's the caterpillar stage of a certain moth, and

44:57

the eggs are almost invisible. I've had some.

45:00

I'd bite me, no kidding.

45:02

I stopped growing tomatoes because

45:04

of those awful creatures. They can also

45:06

strip your whole plant in a matter of a few

45:08

days. So

45:10

they're no joke, apparently

45:14

not. I don't want to encounter one of these.

45:16

I said it before, we all say it again. I'm

45:20

glad. I'm glad. I haven't. Yes, I

45:23

feel lucky, and we are lucky

45:25

to get such wonderful letters and comments

45:28

from listeners. Yes. Absolutely,

45:30

if you would like to send us something lovely,

45:33

you can. We have an email. It is food

45:35

Stuff at how stuff works dot com. We're also

45:37

on social media on Facebook

45:40

and Twitter at food Stuff hs

45:42

W stands for house Stuff Works, and on Instagram

45:45

at food Stuff. Thanks also

45:47

to our audio engineer, Tristan McNeil.

45:50

And as Annie said, we're we're

45:53

turning into a pumpkin over here. So that's

45:56

literally all I wrote is we're turning into

45:58

a pumpkin. Joke for that, you guys,

46:00

couldn't You guys couldn't write

46:02

that for yourselves? Sure? Yeah, and

46:05

we hope that lots more good things are coming your way,