Needles and a Pen » Knitting, Sewing, and Nursing School

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  • Welcome to my blog!

    Hi! I'm Traci. I'm a Registered Nurse who loves quilting, knitting, cross stitch, and the great outdoors. In my pre-scrubs life, I owned Real Photography, and you can still see my old wedding and portrait photography site here .

    I've created a map that shows links to our camping/hiking/general family fun review posts that you can find here. It's pretty much the coolest thing on this site. Thanks, Google!

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sweet and spicy pumpkin seed brittle

I made this for a playdate yesterday, so I had a batch of pumpkin seeds left over.  It’s always hard to decide how to cook my pumpkin seeds, whether to go classic with oil and salt, or fancy it up with spices.  For our first pumpkin seeds of the year, though, I decided to go with this family favorite.

Spicy Pumpkin Seed Brittle

Ingredients:

pumpkin seeds (rinsed and dried)

4 T butter
1 cup brown sugar
2 T molasses

1/4t red pepper (if your family isn’t a big fan of spicy, drop this to 1/8th)
1 1/2t cinnamon
1/2 t nutmeg
1/2 t allspice
1/8 t garlic powder (just trust me on this)
dash pepper
1/4 t salt

Directions:

Preheat oven to 325.  Combine butter, brown sugar, and molasses in a sauce pan over medium heat.  Once the ingredients have combined, add in the spices.

Line the bottom of a pan with parchment paper.  Sprinkle the pumpkin seeds over the parchment paper and then pour in your sugar/spice/butter mixture.  Place in the oven for about 20-30 minutes.  (This is the hardest part–you want the pumpkin seeds to cook, but you don’t want the sugar to burn.  I don’t think I’ve mastered this yet and it seems to depend on how moist your seeds are, but if you get this part down to a science, let me know your trick!)

 

Kate - This looks delish! By ‘red pepper’ do you mean cayenne pepper?

Jacey - Mmm, that sounds heavenly! I love pumpkin seeds, and I typically just toast them with some seasoning. I’ll have to try this one, though. Pinning now!

Traci - Yes–I think it’s regional name difference on the pepper. Like green onions and scallions. 🙂

Beth Moore - I clearly need to schedule more playdates with you.

Susanne - I’m going to try this tonight. Wish me luck : D

Holly U - Oh my, this is intriguing. I love sweet, my husband loves salty….I’m thinking this will make us both happy!