Here in the UK, my autumn memories are not of Halloween but rather of Guy Fawkes, bonfires and fireworks; my birthday falls a few days after bonfire night so when I was a child I always had my party to coincide with the ready made entertainment of the village fireworks party. Due to increasingly restrictive health and safety laws there seem to be fewer and fewer village bonfires and firework displays, which I find sad, and Halloween seems to be becoming more popular every year. This year Diwali (the Hindu festival of light) falls on the 5th November so I am hoping London will be doubly ablaze with fireworks. I once went on the London Eye with a group of friends before my birthday supper, and rather splendidly we could see fireworks in all directions from the top.
A couple of weeks ago I was sent a Waitrose pumpkin carving kit complete with carving tools, stencils and a pumpkin. The courier was slightly bemused as mine was his 5th pumpkin delivery of the day. Halloween is big business, mainly in the USA, googling “pumpkin carving” brings up over 1.75M results and some very impressive work (my favourite is probably the Death Star Pumpkin)
I have only carved a pumpkin once before, I was armed with only a kitchen knife and it was neither a good nor easy experience. My jack o’ lantern had several teeth missing, by accident rather than design, and was decidedly rustic looking. I have to confess that I had been putting the carving off as it was so difficult last time. This afternoon I set to work, found a stencil I liked (and which looked easy to carve) and set to work. I was surprised to find that with the pumpkin carving kit it was actually very easy, there was a pin wheel to trace the design from the stencil onto the pumpkin and two mini saws made the cutting really very easy. I half wish I had chosen a more complex design, but I am delighted with my spooky alien. I have to confess that the pumpkin pulp went in the bin, the scraping to hollow out my pumpkin produced a bowl of slivers of watery flesh. I hope to buy another pumpkin tomorrow to cook with as I have a plan for a Halloween dip.
New this year; for the keenest of carvers, Waitrose is selling Sumo Pumpkins. Weighing in at 40kg they cost £30, and there is enough flesh for 120 bowls of pumpkin soup. Should you buy one Waitrose even have Pumpkin Porters to carry it to your car!
Waitrose Sumo Pumpkin - Photo from Waitrose
Thanks to Waitrose for my free pumpkin carving kit.
The porter seems to be a pixie!
London ablaze with fireworks sounds wonderful, I might have to find an excuse to nip up to town.
Nice pumpkin.Carving I am into that at the moment.Your kit sounds ace, didn’t know such a kit was available.
strangely enough, today I heard someone talk about pumpkin carving tools for the first time – and now here you are with your own kit – I also heard that those orange American pumpkin are much easier to carve than our Australian ones – I love yours – hope it will make your birthday special, along with all those fireworks
I agree, I remember bonfire night being far more of a big deal than Hallowe’en. I think Hallowe’en has gone too far now, it’s just an excuse for supermarkets to make money now. Bring back Penny for the Guy I say!!
“Sumo Pumpkins” LOL what BRILLIANT name for these!
Forget carving them, think of the amount of wonderful pumpkin soup you could get out of one of these babies!
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