Toasty Delicious Pepitos

• raw pumpkin seeds
• 2-3 Tbsp butter, melted
• 1/2 - 2/3 cup brown sugar, not packed!
• cinnamon to taste (I love cinnamon and used like 1 1/2 Tbsp

When you pull your seeds from your pumpkin, clean them thoroughly and let them dry completely (3 or 4 days, usually). This is always the hardest part for me, finding the patience while they dry, I want to enjoy them NOW, dammit! Stir the seeds around a few times a day so they can all dry. Once they're dry, the seeds will no longer stick together, and if you've never handled raw pumpkin seeds before, you'll notice they feel a bit soft compared to the toasted ones you're used to.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Place seeds on a cookie sheet or sheet pan. Pour melted butter over the seeds, stir until coated and spread into a thin layer. Sprinkle with cinnamon and brown sugar and stir a bit.

Place in oven for approximately 15 minutes or until seeds are just starting to darken in color. The brown sugar-butter mixture should be bubbly and gooey looking. Stir the seeds until well coated with the melted sugar.

Enjoy warm, or let them cool and enjoy them later. If any seeds survive long enough to cool, make sure you stir them occasionally as the cool to keep them from becoming one solid brick of pumpkin seeds.

Wicked Hot Pumpkin Seeds

Ok, so the pic's not fantastic, and the recipe's a bit overdue, but I only make these this morning. With all the humidity, it took days for my pumpkin seeds to dry.

Ingredients:
Fresh pumpkins seeds (rinsed well with all the stringy crap removed)
Table Salt
Hungarian Hot Paprika (or ground cayenne)
Vegetable Oil

Once your seeds are completely dry from the rinsing, preheat your oven to 300 degrees. While the oven preheats, pour a couple tablespoons of vegetable oil over the pumpkin seeds and stir until coated. Don't use any more oil than you have too.

Sprinkle with salt to taste and add paprika generously. Stir to coat. Spread seeds in a thin, even layer on a cookie sheet and bake for 30 minutes, stirring twice along the way. Let cool 5 minutes or so and enjoy.

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My seeds are different sizes and colors because I carved my jack o'lanterns from a few different varieties of pumpkin. Some on them had small seeds and one even had seeds with no hull (that's the green ones).