An Autumnal Dessert.

Somethings take a bit of getting used to and for a born and bred Brit, sweet pumpkin is one of those tastes that seems strange on first acquaintance. If you hail from the USA, you will have grown up with pumpkin pie and wonder what I am talking about, but most of us from the British Isles find pumpkin just a bit too vegetably to be eaten for dessert. But it didn't take me long to acquire the taste and now Kabak Tatlısı is one of my favourite puddings. (I will be taken to task by some because the definition of pudding is a dessert with a creamy consistency but where I come from, pudding is what we eat after our dinner). Baked pumpkin is the perfect colour for autumn and takes no effort to make which is great when we are busy outside getting the garden ready for winter.  I buy my pumpkin ready cut from the market, I can watch the stall holders prepare it so I know it's fresh, then all that is needed is to transfer it to an oven-proof dish, pour over a cup of sugar, leave for 4 hours or overnight until the flesh has given up it's liquid and dissolved the sugar, then pop in a 180 C oven for 45 minutes until soft. Cover with a lid if you like your pumpkin in syrup, cook uncovered if you like a stickier sweet, but stir every 10 minutes so it is well coated.  I recommend Özlem's Turkish Table recipe, but admit to grating half a nutmeg over my dish before putting it in the oven, which gives it a hint of a British comfort pudding. A good dollop of clotted cream or Turkish kaymak adds some serious calories, but with all the shovelling and earth moving going on in the BacktoBodrum flower beds, they are well earned.