We roast the pumpkin, and if it's watery, cook it down. Libby is condensed anyway. I also use quimo or whatever it's called - has a little gelatin in it.

In light of Thanksgiving, I thought I could revive this thread a bit.

I agree with the others that canned pumpkin usually gives better results for pies. I just noticed coop has pumpkin puree:
https://www.coop.ch/en/food/inventor...uree/p/6359421

Has anyone tried this in a pie?

IMO waaaaaaaay too watery for the traditional (that is, my MIL's time-honored, passed down over generations) Thanksgiving pumpkin pie recipe.

On the second go I let the puree strain through a cheesecloth overnight. Better results, but still not Libbys. BTW, if you are going to strain the puree you might need 2-3 times the starting amount.

Have you tried drying it in oven, on 80°C or something, 6-8 hours, maybe overnight? I have drier home, but in this case oven should be even better, with higher temps maybe some natural sugars will become more pronounced. Famous Maillard reaction that helps our food to taste so good is running also at low temperatures (from 70°C), albeit much slower.

I often weight my products before and after drying, so I know how much water is lost. Useful for repeating successful recipes.

I've always used one of these to make pumpkin puree from real pumpkins for pies, cake, etc

Attached Images

 

I use a kaboucha pumpkin. Very dense. Then I roast it. As good as Libby’s imho.

We have tried that in a pie, it was atrocious! The consistency and especially the taste were horrible.

LOEB/Globus foods sell an american canned pumpkin that we've been cooking with for years. It tastes perfect and if you're worried about the ingredients/preservatives the only ingredient is pumpkin (which is refreshing for an american product).

I've only dried fresh pumpkin to make doggie chew sticks. My efforts were not appreciated by the target audience.

Mostly I use homemade pumpkin puree as I would use applesauce for baking.

---

This year, thanks to the pandemic, I can't have the traditional family Thanksgiving - and I fear that a pale immitation of tradition would only make me sad. So I've thrown in the towel and am doing a whole different menu.

Also, thanks to the pandemic, I've run out of a key ingredient in MIL's recipe: brown sugar. (There might be a thread on this topic somewhere... )

So no pumpkin pie this year. 2020 doesn't deserve pumkin pie.

The lack of brown sugar this year has been rough, we've almost exhausted all of our supplies. Every time we tried to get more sugar, the borders closed or our flights got canceled. Now we're on reserves....

I keep a stock of molasses instead of brown sugar but my molasses is running low. Sugar mixed with maple syrup or even that odd pear syrup thing should do the trick.

I’ve found brown sugar in my local Asiaway. It’s not as soft as the dominio I grew up with, but works in a pinch. I also ordered some Tate and Lyle from the British corner shop online.

I substitute white sugar + molasses for brown sugar as well. Works quite well.