Chili from a Pumpkin Pot!

The weather is just perfect right now and the trees are just beautiful.  I'm pretty sure my fascination with fall (and colorful leaves) has something to do with growing up in western KS- where you have to plant them if you want them and rarely are they deciduous.  Every tree you plant should serve a purpose- to block winter wind from the north or hot summer wind from the south, etc.  The spring before my sister's wedding my parents had two trees (maple or something similar of the "more pretty and less practical" variety) planted in the front yard and only one of the poor things actually made it through the rough summer of hot dry wind.  The other shriveled up and died before the wedding and ended up recieving a makeover at rehearsal with cuts from the privet hedge and a little Scotch tape.  Funny stuff.

Anyway (to get back on subject), last week I ran across this guest post from Bethany on Brooklyn Limestone just after inviting David's family over for chili and pumpkin carving and I knew it was perfect.  You should have seen the look on David's face as I hauled the thing in the house and told him what I was going to do with it.  It was priceless.  First he tried to talk me out of it, then he informed me that his portion better not be served from that thing, but in the end he was a good sport.  I think he was secretly impressed.

To make your pumpkin pot, simply choose one of the largest, roundest pumpkins you can find.  Choose one with a better handle (stem) than mine though.  Cut out the lid, clean out the guts, spray it inside and out with Pam and bake it at 350 for an hour on a large cookie sheet.  Remember to remove the top oven rack before turning the oven on. :)  I put the soup in the pumpkin right when it came out of the oven and it stayed hot for at least an hour and a half.  And I can assure you the chili did not taste like pumkin.

We had chili, cornbread muffins, tossed salad and Kenlynn's pumpkin pie.  Yummy!

We carved pumpkins after supper!

I forgot to take pictures of them all lined up last night, but here are the ones we did.  In case you can't tell, the one on the left is a kitty silhouette and the one on the right is the Christian fish symbol.  We kept it pretty simple.

Oh, and by the way, I have a confession.  The pictures you see above of the table all set.... were taken today.  Yeah, I know.... a little pathetic.  But really, what else did I have to do today anyway?  :)  And, yes, the pumpkin is starting to stink.