Experimenting with one weird trick for faster, better roasted pumpkin seeds

I only ran this experiment the day after Halloween, so timing-wise this post is the equivalent of chocolate pumpkins that are on 75% off clearance right now. But I hope to pick up with this technique next year and build on it, so I’m writing this down.

This Halloween, two mom friends informed me during our trick-or-treating that people boil their pumpkin seeds in salt water prior to roasting them to produce a more tender, less fibrous final product. The ” more tender” apart appealed to me, but adding steps of boiling them in brine and then drying them before finally roasting them in the oven sounded like too much work.

I went online (which these days mostly means to Reddit, sigh). The boil-first crowd stated that the goal was to cook the inside of the seed In a way that roasting doesn’t accomplish. This was the ah-ha moment for me: couldn’t I do the same thing in the microwave? I sometimes zap potatoes in the microwave before baking or frying them to reduce the overall cook time. The microwave should heat the water on the inside of the seed and cook it from the inside. Same idea as briefly microwaving a grilled cheese or quesadilla to melt the cheese before frying the outsides.

I searched up microwaves and pumpkin seeds but only found people asking about using a microwave for the entire process, in lieu of roasting. Which was obvious malarkey, Jack. No one was writing about parcooking in the microwave and finishing in the oven.

So I tried it. I put about two cups of seeds, rinsed with water to remove the pumpkin glop and left wet, in a covered microwavable bowl and microwaved for about 3 minutes. Then I spread them out to dry and roasted them with oil and salt.

The control batch was boiled in salt water for 10 minutes, then dried completely overnight and roasted with oil and salt.

The microwaved seeds were at least as soft as the boiled ones, if not softer! I did not save enough to run a scientific A/B test unfortunately. 

A bonus: my understanding is that microwaving the seeds should be drying them out, while boiling them leaves them wetter, so you can get them in the oven quicker if you microwave. That, plus not making saltwater and boiling and getting another pot dirty, makes for a shorter and cleaner cooking process with a result that is at least as good.

Next year it’s rinse, drain, microwave, dry, roast. I should be able to go from whole pumpkin to eating tasty seeds in an afternoon.