I should clarify my earlier post. I do like the spices which are commonly associated with pumpkin, as long as there is no pumpkin involved. Like most folks, there are foods which I don't really care for but can still easily eat, however there are a select few that are so repugnant as to not be edible. They are mostly limited to sweetish vegetables including pumpkin, yams, sweet potatoes, beets, and winter squash. Cooked carrots are rough, but I can choke a bit down with enough salt.

That's unusual. Do you eat other sweet foods, fruit? The bulk of my sugar comes from fruit and I love all the vegetables you listed. I’m not crazy about raw carrots, but could eat cooked carrots several times a week.

This thread has made me think. I realize I season winter squash with nutmeg and cloves when I bake it. A little salt, pepper and olive oil and it’s one of my favorite starches.

Yes, I like sweet desserts a lot. More and more the older I get.:) Most all fruit too. There is just some kind of common strange sweetness shared by those vegetables.

Well this didn't age well.

I couldn't pass up the pumpkin kringle at Trader Joe's, nor the Starbucks PSL creamer at Safeway. My wife returned from Costco this morning with a pumpkin pie.

Might as well find some pumpkin pie ice cream. I recall 31 flavors made a good one.

Pumpkin Chef Katsura
 

Many moons ago, there was a Tokyo restaurant by the name of Pumpkin Chef Katsura. Each dish had pumpkin in it.

The restaurant didn't last long, but I wax nostalgic about it, particularly during the autumn.

n.b. they actually used kabocha, which is sweeter and denser than a standard issue pumpkin.

n.b.b. I like pumpkin-flavored things, but sometimes they get way too chemically. Jamba Juice used to have a fun concoction, perhaps contemporaneously with Pumpkin Chef Katsura. 20 years ago, maybe a couple less?

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I love, love, love pumpkin spice - but even better is pumpkin cream cold foam from Starbucks - drown me in the stuff.

Pumpkin pie, with a wider variety of spices than the usual, is much loved here. Pumpkin spice cake with milk chocolate icing - very popular, too. Note: these are made with actual pumpkin, not "pumpkin flavored"

Faux pumpkin flavored anything, especially coffee, is a hard no.

So true. Pumpkin spice has no pumpkin in it.

That said, Wendy's Pumpkin spice Frosty does and it's pretty tasty.

We're having a party this Saturday and I've already made desserts, among them pumpkin blondies. They are beyond delicious with a salted caramel center. I was looking for something chewy, rather than cakey. As I understand it, the key is, instead of adding pumpkin to the mix, you make (something akin to) pumpkin butter (pumpkin, brown sugar and butter heated together - which would make an amazing ice cream topper by itself).

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...c8a0201c3.jpeg

Sounds heavenly. No way those would make it to Saturday in my house. None.

I know. They're in the freezer. With the lemon bars and the peanut butter chocolate bars. :D

pfft...it would take more than a freezer to deter me from going after those. And maybe even the lemon bars first. I have eaten almost frozen solid pumpkin pie. :p

I really want the recipe for those, they look amazing.

Pumpkin spice is really just a coffee syrup choice in Starbucks and similar chains in the U.K. and I’ve had to make my own getting together all the component spices when trying to recreate an American Fall flavour without an import can of American pumpkin pie filling. “Pumpkin” never features in any of the spice racks in our stores and supermarkets.

I set myself a challenge a few years ago when my daughter was small and still being introduced to foods. I got a box of pumpkins delivered and made different things with each of them.

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...83daffcaa.jpeg
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...e71011e2e.jpeg
Gohei mochi with pumpkin glaze
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...28b4af4b1.jpeg
Pumpkin and miso ice cream
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...6f618c0c3.jpeg
Olla Gitana - with pumpkin, pear and paprika
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...a9c55e108.jpeg
Acorn squash roasted with shio kōji
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...2cd6a2b0b.jpeg
Pumpkin risotto fried and topped with melted Comte
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...460f71e4d.jpeg
Pumpkin and corn chowder with a pumpkin, spelt cornbread
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...5d92e600d.jpeg
Pumpkin soufflé (hadn’t learned the trick of letting it settle in a slightly ajar oven to stop it deflating)
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...b388e00c9.jpeg
Leftover pumpkin cornbread made into a “bread and butter pudding”
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...d35383150.jpeg
Pumpkin and celeriac pasty

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...33711d7f5.jpeg
pumpkin in my attempt at a Teochew style pastry

Not one of them had the “pumpkin flavor” this thread is about.

You've got a PM.

Sounds good. I don't mind pumpkin when it's in a savory dish, it's the "pumpkin spices" that I find truly disgusting. Including the pumpkin beers.

Yet another reason :)

Interesting, there's something to this because I would have the same list of sweet vegetables. In fact, I've only learned to like a couple other types of squashes in the last few years (as my taste buds age?). Sweet potatoes and yams are definite No's. Pumpkin and beets are No 90% of the time. My wife will eat most squashes, but agrees on pumpkins and beets. Can't remember how she feels about sweet potatoes, but she's never brought one home. Cooked carrots, for both of us, fall into the category of "really don't care for but can still easily eat" as you mentioned.

I would at least try most of these. Thank you for not adding dessert spices to a gourd!