Pumpkin Chocolate Peanut Halva to celebrate the fall season

a steamed low carb treat I created to use up leftover mashed pumpkin

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Fall season is blooming in New York City. A stroll in Central Park delights the eyes with every shade of fall colored leaves. Has the fall season arrived for you?

This season also invites all things cosy. I am drinking more cups of tea each day, wanting hot chocolate at night, and craving fall favorites like the pumpkin spice latte. While browsing my local market I came upon a can of mashed pumpkin and felt compelled to buy it. I used some in pumpkin oats and pumpkin chia pudding for breakfast but still had half the can to use up before it spoiled. An idea for a pumpkin halva came to my mind - limited in scope to using only the ingredients available on hand in my temporary kitchen and keeping it relatively low carb.

Annoyingly, my temporary kitchen does not have mixing bowls so I have to improvise and use a stainless steel pot to combine ingredients. I added ~200g mashed pumpkin, 35g chocolate (or regular) peanut powder, 35g lupin bean flour, 1 large egg, 2 tsp or more ground cinnamon, and sweetener of choice to taste (I used 1/4 tsp of stevia extract). I would’ve liked to add some vanilla extract but did not have any. I’d recommend being mindful to use the unsweetened mashed pumpkin and not a pie mix unless you like those flavors in this halva.

I greased a bowl with ~5ml neutral oil (avocado oil) and poured in the batter. I steamed it covered for 30 mins on a stove pot steamer, checking with my knife midway to ensure texture has become slightly stiff (it will not be too solid or dense, similar to a freshly cooked halva).

I divided it into four portions but somehow managed to eat two warm portions in one sitting with a dollop of plain yogurt (I wish I had vanilla yogurt!). I saved the other two servings in the fridge overnight after which the texture had become a bit more solid and was quite nice to consume chilled the next day for breakfast.

My quest to use up the leftover pumpkin was successful but I do plan to improve upon this recipe with further iterations. I’m considering testing the following:

• Cooking: steaming vs baking vs microwave vs refrigerate

• Ingredients: eggs vs baking soda, almond flour vs lupin flour, adding vanilla extract

• Form: halva vs cake, frosting of yogurt vs cream cheese

Do you have any recommendations for my future iterations?

Dish Debrief

• Is this my winner or disaster? win

• How would I rate this dish out of 10? 7/10

• What would I change next time? needs more experimentation

• Would I make this again? oh yes, especially in the fall