Pumpkin seeds liqueur

I tasted this liqueur for the first time a few years ago in Austria. If someone hadn’t told me back then that the liqueur was made of pumpkin seeds, I wouldn’t have noticed it myself, based on its taste. The only thing that revealed that it might be pumpkin was the consistency of the liqueur. This liqueur is not completely creamy, as it has a distinctly mixed seeds in it. I tried to make this liqueur for a while and now finally I managed. Now is the best time to make all sorts of pumpkin dishes. Pumpkin and pumpkin seeds are widely available in stores so you need to take the opportunity and make this beverage.

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Ingredients for pumpkin seeds liqueur.

• 300 ml white rum (I used Bacardi)
• 500 ml milk
• powdered vanilla pudding (40 g)
• 150 g crystal sugar
• 125 g pumpkin seeds
• 2 tablespoons of water
• 3-4 drops of vanilla extract

How to make pumpkin seeds liqueur.

Roast the pumpkin seeds on a pan, cool them down and chop or blend them very finely. Put the chopped seeds into a small container, pour rum over them and set them aside for an hour.

From the 500 ml of milk, pour 150 ml into a cup and mix it with the pudding powder and vanilla extract.

Pour sugar and water into a pot. Heat over a low heat, stirring occasionally, until the sugar turns golden brown and liquid. At that point, pour in the milk and stir from time to time so that caramel is formed from the sugar. Then, add the mixed pudding from the cup, stirring constantly, bring it to boil and keep it on the heat for 1-2 minutes. Once done, cool down the pudding.

Put the cold pudding and the pumpkin seeds with the rum into a blender and mix. Pour the liqueur into small bottles and keep it in the fridge.

Good to know when making pumpkin seeds liqueur.

The pumpkin seeds used to prepare the liqueur must be peeled. You can get such pumpkin seeds in stores.

I roasted the seeds in a non-stick pan for 10 minutes. The roasting should be done on a very low heat so that the seeds do not burn. From time to time, they should be stirred with a spoon.

If you do not have time or you do not want to, you do not have to make caramel but only cook the pudding with sugar. However, I encourage you to devote those few minutes to preparing the caramel, because it definitely changes the taste of the liqueur.

Do not panic when the liquid sugar turns into “rock” after pouring milk into it. You need to heat the mixture until the sugar dissolves.

My blender didn’t grind the pumpkin seeds the way I wanted, so I also used a hand blender. You can pour the liqueur through a strainer, but you have to reckon the fact that quite a lot of mixed seeds will be discarded. Personally, the fact that the seeds are noticeable in the liqueur does not bother me at all.

The liqueur tastes best when you wait two or three days, by which time the ingredients have a chance to combine well with each other.

Are you looking for dishes made from pumpkin? If so, try our recipe for Pumpkin pizza.