Roasted Pumpkin Seeds - Pepitas

By kelseyll

Ingredients

• Freshly scraped out pumpkin seeds
• Oil
• Table salt

Details

Adapted from thepioneerwoman.com

Preparation

Step 1

1. As you gut the pumpkins, keep all the seeds—and guts—in a bowl.
2. Throw them into a colander and rinse them under cold water, pulling away the chunks of pulp as you go.
3. Spread the rinsed seeds out on a baking sheet. Don’t worry about removing every last bit of pulp.
4. Now, THIS IS IMPORTANT: Allow the seeds to dry several hours or overnight. And beware: they’re quite sticky/slimy, so don’t place them on paper towels! Just leave ‘em on the baking sheet and they’ll be fine.
5. When they’re nice and dry, go ahead and preheat the oven to 250 degrees. Begin by drizzling the seeds with a couple teaspoons of olive oil. Use your fingers to toss the seeds around to coat. Then salt the seeds generously. I use regular table salt for this one. Kosher salt’s flakes are too big. And you can really go nuts with the seasoning: cayenne pepper, seasoned salt, even curry powder. But I like to keep it simple.
6. Now just pop ‘em in the oven for an hour or so, until the seeds are light golden brown.

Pepitas need to be stored in an airtight container if they last beyond the first day. But ’round these parts, that hardly ever happens.