The great pumpkin dumplings

Great because they're easy and come with brown butter and plenty of Parmesan.

View in browser|nytimes.com October 17, 2024 Carolina Gelen's pumpkin dumplings with brown butter and Parmesan. Armando Rafael for The New York Times The great pumpkin dumplings By Mia Leimkuhler Sometimes I bring home a kabocha, my favorite pumpkin, and split it open using a cleaver and a rubber-tipped hammer. I scoop out the seeds and put the halves face down on a Silpat-lined sheet pan to roast in a 400-degree oven for about an hour. When they're done and cool enough to handle, I scrape the soft flesh from the collapsed halves into my food processor and blitz it into a smooth purée, snacking on any particularly meaty kabocha skin scraps. That purée goes into the fridge, ready for any pumpkin recipes I might want to make that week. And sometimes I just pick up a can of pumpkin, because it's good and cheap and doesn't require said cleaver and hammer. Either way, having some pumpkin purée on hand gets you one-seventh of the way to these pillowy pumpkin dumplings with brown butter and Parmesan, a new recipe from Carolina Gelen. Reminiscent of spaetzle, gnudi or galuska, these free-form dumplings consist of pumpkin purée, eggs, Parmesan and flour; a bit of nutmeg plants them squarely in Autumntown. The soft batter is scraped into boiling, salted water with a spoon; no fussy rolling or cutting is required. In sum: Get pumpkin, make pumpkin dumplings. Featured Recipe Pumpkin Dumplings With Brown Butter and Parmesan View Recipe → We've entered the part of the year when I try to keep potatoes on hand, stashing a bag of cute little Yukon golds next to my onions. With a package of skin-on, bone-in chicken thighs and a bunch of scallions, I basically have Kay Chun's punchy sheet-pan chicken with potatoes, scallions and capers. The punch comes from those capers, plus a healthy squeeze of lemon. The rest of that bag of potatoes will go into this new golden potato and greens soup, a vegan take on potato leek soup from Andy Baraghani. Mashing the potatoes in the pot as they soften gives the soup its creamy, thick texture; ground turmeric and red chile flakes add color, warmth and lift. Sour cream is one of those things I buy without a specific plan for it, but knowing I'll use it somehow. (At the very least, it'll be scooped up with potato chips.) A particularly lush plan would be this roasted salmon with miso cream, a simple stunner from Genevieve Ko. Keep this one bookmarked for the upcoming holidays; "Wonderful way to have a main dish at a celebration and not feel cheated that you didn't have meat," writes Scott, a reader. "Delicious, elegant, beautiful, and ridiculously easy." Dip for dinner isn't just a summer thing, as my wise colleague Tanya Sichynsky has pointed out in The Veggie. All you need to do is swap out a cold dip for a hot one, and Melissa Knific's jalapeño corn dip looks like exactly the sort of molten, cheesy skillet I want to dig into on a gray, why-aren't-you-Friday Thursday night. Lastly: The other night my husband, staring down a bunch of brown bananas, asked me for the easiest banana bread recipe in the New York Times Cooking database. I handed him Genevieve's vegan banana bread: no butter creaming or melting required, no fancy equipment or fussy techniques, no chance of picking bits of eggshell out of the batter. It was excellent, and now I'm on a vegan baking kick. So next up are these vegan chocolate cupcakes, a five-star recipe from Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero, adapted by Pete Wells. I'll leave you with this reader note: "As a non-vegan, I 100 percent endorse that these are as good as any other 'best chocolate cake' recipe. I have my small collection of chocolate cake recipes I stand by and am quite the snob when it comes to tasting other cakes that aren't up to snuff, but these cupcakes made the list." IN THIS NEWSLETTER Con Poulos for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Sheet-Pan Chicken With Potatoes, Scallions and Capers By Kay Chun 40 minutes Makes 4 servings David Malosh for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Golden Potato and Greens Soup By Andy Baraghani 1 hour Makes 4 to 6 servings Christopher Testani for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Potato Leek Soup By Kay Chun 45 minutes Makes 4 servings (about 7 cups) Armando Rafael for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Cyd Raftus McDowell. Roasted Salmon With Miso Cream By Genevieve Ko 30 minutes Makes 8 servings Christopher Testani for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Jalapeño-Corn Dip By Melissa Knific 30 minutes Makes 8 servings Joseph De Leo for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Monica Pierini. Vegan Banana Bread By Genevieve Ko 1 1/4 hours, plus cooling Makes One 9- or 10-inch cake (8 to 12 servings) Christopher Testani for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Vegan Chocolate Cupcakes Recipe from Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero Adapted by Pete Wells 40 minutes Makes Makes 12 cupcakes Sign up for the Five Weeknight Dishes newsletter Fresh dinner ideas for busy people who want something great to eat, with NYT Cooking recipes sent to you weekly. Get it in your inbox Sign up for The Veggie newsletter Tanya Sichynsky shares the most delicious vegetarian recipes for weeknight cooking, packed lunches and dinner parties. Get it in your inbox Need help? Review our newsletter help page or contact us for assistance. You received this email because you signed up for Cooking from The New York Times. To stop receiving Cooking, unsubscribe. 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