The Versatile Pumpkin, at Home in Northeast Ohio

The History and Importance of Pumpkin in Northeast Ohio

Pumpkin may be just the perfect fall and winter food in Northeast Ohio. It is indigenous to our region, locally grown, nutritious and versatile.  Pumpkin is high in A and C vitamins as well as iron, calcium and potassium. Use of pumpkin as food goes way beyond pie as can be seen from the recipes on this page.  Pumpkin is mild flavored, a touch sweet and a touch starchy, Thus it makes a good substitute for potatoes, yams and eggplant.  In a highly spicy recipe such as pasta sauce, it can even replace the tomatoes which go out-of-season by early fall in Ohio.  Pumpkin can be converted into a number of recipes right out of the skin.  It cuts easily and boils quickly.  As fresh pumpkin becomes scarcer late in the winter, canned pumpkin is a satisfactory substitute.  Some pumpkin is commercially canned right in our region, in Solon, Ohio, for example.

Ohio is among the top five pumpkin growing states in the country.  In 2005, one recent year with statistics available, 7,400 acres in Ohio were planted with pumpkins. Indians in Ohio grew pumpkin as one of their staple crops; it was one of the “three sister” trio of beans, corn and squash.  The pumpkin native to the Northeastern United States and also the type still eaten here today is a variety of the same species, Cucurbits pepo, that also yields summer and winter squash and certain gourds.  Indians enjoyed pumpkin seeds and roasted strips of pumpkin over an open fire.  They also dried the long pumpkin fibers and wove them into mats.

A little investigation into the archaeologica recordl reveals that pumpkins first appeared as human food in what’s now Northeast Ohio about 2,200 years ago.  The oldest pumpkin seeds in our region were found near the Vermillion River in Lorain County.  They are associated with Early Woodland native peoples.  These inhabitants certainly gathered wild pumpkin and probably experimented with pumpkin horticulturally.  Such experimentation with pumpkin constitutes our region’s first agriculture.

Pumpkin originated in Central America.  It was first domesticated in Oaxaca, Mexico 10,000 years ago.  Evidence for this early cultivation comes from the pumpkin seeds at archaeological sites being larger than what occurred at that time in nature.  There is no evidence that domestication of pumpkin in Northeastern North America relates to the earlier Mexican domestication.  It could have happened independently.   At one time it was thought that pumpkin reached more northerly sections of the continent by escaping Mexican cultivation in prehistoric times. Botanists believe the subspecies of squash or pumpkin Cucurbitas pepo ovifera is native to the northern part of the continent and first domesticated in the Eastern Woodlands.

For Further Reading

Decker, Deena.  Origin, Evolution and Systematics of Cucurbita pepo (Cucurbitaceae) 1. Economic Botany 42:1 (1988) 4ff.

Johnson, Kristen.  Paleoethnobotany in Johnson, J.K., ed.  The Development of Southeastern Archaeology.  Tuscaloosa, AL: Univ. Alabama Press, 1993.

Kirkpatrick, Kurt et al. Allozyme Differentiation in the Cucurbita  pepo Complex: C. pepo var. medullosa v. C. pepo texana 1. Economic Botany 39:3 (1985) 289.

Shane, Orrin III. The Leimbach Site: an early Woodland Village in Lorain County, Ohio in Prufer, Olaf and Douglas Mckenzie, ed's. Studies in Ohio Archaeology. Kent, OH: Kent State Univ Press, 1975. 98-120

Stothers, David. Early Woodland Prehistory in the Western Lake Erie Drainage Basin in Otto, M. and B. Redmond, ed’s Transitions: Archaic and Early Woodland Research in the Ohio Country. Columbus: Ohio State Univ. Press, 2008. 79ff.

USDA National Agriculture Statistics Service (NASS). Statistical Highlights: “2005 Pumpkin Harvest Bountiful, USDA Reports Production Numbers On The Rise.” NASS Newsroom webpage.  2006.  Accessed Oct. 31, 2010 at http://www.nass.usda.gov/Newsroom/2006/10_16_2006.asp.

University of Illinois Extension.  Pumpkins and More webpage. Univ. Illinois Board of Trustees, 2010.  Accessed Oct. 31, 2010 at http://urbanext.illinois.edu/pumpkins/facts.cfm.

Zeder, Melinda Documenting Domestication: New Genetic and Archaeological Paradigms.  Berkeley, CA: Univ California Press, 2006. 27ff

Linguini with Pumpkin and Clam Sauce

1 ½ to 2 Cups almost cooked fresh pumpkin (Best method of cooking is to boil pumpkin in skin, then remove flesh. 

Can cook pumpkin while steaming clams; then use water pumpkin boiled in to cook pasta.)

10-12 boiled or steamed clams; clams done when open; discard any clams that do not open; 

remove meat from clam shells and cut larger clam meats into smaller pieces.

Whole wheat linguini, sufficient amount to make 8 cups cooked. (Refer to package instructions.)

Bring water to a boil.  Add linguini and cook on medium with olive oil and salt.

1 small onion, coarsely chopped.

2 teaspoons or more dried Greek blend seasoning (Try to go for blend that has more garlic and less mint.)

1 cup white wine

2 Tablespoons fresh rosemary

¼ Cup fresh parsley

1 ½ Tablespoons olive oil

2 Tablespoons red wine vinegar

¼ Cup sun dried tomatoes, chopped

Fresh ground black pepper to taste

water as needed for consistency

(OPTIONAL) parmesan cheese

Bring wine to a low boil.  Simmer onions in wine 15 minutes.  (Linguini can be cooked at same time.)

Add other ingredients EXCEPT parsley and simmer 15 more minutes.

Remove from heat, add parsley to sauce, stir in and let stand a minute with lid on.

Drain linguini and serve with sauce and optional parmesan cheese

Please download my Guerilla Cookbook which has six pumpkin recipes.  I wrote all the text, designed the graphic layout, invented 32 recipes and took half of the photos. My espresso-pumpkin chili recipe which appeared in Our Ohio 87:1 (Fall 2008) captures the spirit of the kitchen guerilla. This recipe is a tasteful fusion of East and West.  It is also vegan.   The cookbook has nine vegan recipes and six others that with a little tweaking can be made vegan.  The Guerilla Cookbook aims in an animal and planet friendly direction while still offering something for every palate.