Japanese Pumpkin Pie
Kabocha, also known as Japanese pumpkin, is a versatile and delicious winter squash. The flavor is starchy and sweet, with a firm body that can handle being cooked many ways, from tempura-fried to roasted to steamed to sweet purees. The seeds are plump. The hard skin is edible. The squash experience is complete.
Once upon a time there was just one kind of kabocha squash. It was dark green, mediumsized and roundish. Nowadays there are myriad varieties of kabocha, including the bright orange sunshine, the striped green Cha-Cha, the ruddy Black Forest, and my favorite, the pale grey Winter Sweet.
According to the Johnny’s seed catalog, “Winter Sweet delivers a winning combination of sweetness, flaky texture, and depth of flavor that has made it a favorite on our research farm. Not only that, this reliable producer keeps very well and improves with storage.”
We have a farmstand in front of our house, maintained by my kids and supplied by a grumpy farmer south of town. He grew most of the above kabocha varieties I just named, plus butternut, delicata and other winter squash varieties. As I have cooked my way through the squash inventory, I have proven again and again that pie is the highest form of winter squash eatery. It’s the one form of squash of which nobody gets sick. And there is an infinite universe of possibility inside every squash pie.
I don’t use any of the pie spices except nutmeg, so its piney, resin-y flavor can stand alone against the squash pie flavors.
I tend to enhance my squash pies with chocolate, which goes so perfectly with squash pie. And the other day, when I was feeling particularly indulgent, I decided to bake a chocolate chip squash pie with a pecan pie on top, the two layers separated from one another by a layer of chocolate. It was as decadent as one might expect. A pie-opening moment, to say the least.