Creamy Pumpkin Caraway Sauerkraut

To be honest, pumpkin and sauerkraut were never my favorite things to eat. After years of food blogging, and 10 spent living in Germany I have surprised myself by developing a taste for both.  I’ve been officially worn down or converted or whatever.

If these two foods were not that interesting for me, then putting them together in the same dish would never have happened never in a million years. Here I am, a grown up food blogger with my adapted German palate marrying the two in this recipe.

In developing this pumpkin sauerkraut dish, I focused on making the recipe simple and flavorful. I was unprepared for how delicious the end result would be.

In this recipe, sauerkraut is combined with pan-fried onions, pumpkin puree, cream, vegetable broth,  and caraway seeds. That’s it.

Make your own pumpkin puree from a roasted pie pumpkin people. It’s easy to do, take about an hour and a half total and the excellent flavor makes all the difference.

Recipes have to work hard and wow me to earn a place on my Thanksgiving menu. Normally, poor sauerkraut would be laughed out of the room. I’ve just taught my sauerkraut snobby self a lesson as I would happily serve this as a side dish at Thanksgiving. It’s. That. Good. The bonus is you can make it a day in advance.

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Creamy Pumpkin Caraway Sauerkraut

Prep Time: 10 minutes Cook Time: 20 minutes Yield: Serves 6-8

Course Condiment, Side Dish

Cuisine German

Keyword Sauerkraut

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 20 minutes

Total Time 30 minutes

Author Lora Wiley-Lennartz

Ingredients

• 1 cup roasted pumpkin Puree* recipe follows
• 1 medium-sized onion
• 2 cups of sauerkraut drained
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 tablespoon caraway seeds plus a pinch for garnish
• 3/4 cup vegetable broth
• 1 cup 150ml heavy cream
• Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Prepare pumpkin puree (See *Notes) or use canned 🙁

2. Peel and chop onion into small pieces.
3. Squeeze all the liquid you can out of the sauerkraut. When you think you are done squeeze again. Repeat and set aside.
4. Melt the butter in a skillet over medium-high heat
5. Add onions, stirring to coat them in the butter.
6. Cook stirring occasionally until the onions become transparent.
7. Add the caraway seeds and cook for a couple of minutes.
8. Mix in the pumpkin puree.
9. Add the sauerkraut and stir to combine.
   
10. Add the broth and heavy cream.
11. Bring the mixture to a boil.
12. Turn heat down to low. Simmer for 5 minutes.
13. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
14. Remove from heat, garnish with caraway seeds and serve.

Recipe Notes

*For the roasted pumpkin purée:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Place the whole pumpkin on a baking sheet lined with aluminum foil and roast for 15 minutes.

Remove from oven and carefully slice off the stem and cut the pumpkin into quarters.

Return the pieces to the oven and roast for another 40 minutes or until you can easily run a fork through the flesh and skin of the pumpkin.

Remove the pumpkin pieces from the oven and let cool completely. Scrape out the stringy flesh and seeds and set aside.

Use a spoon to scoop out the flesh and transfer to a food processor. Discard or compost the outer skins.

Purée the pumpkin flesh in the processor until smooth.