Jamaican Pumpkin Beef Soup
This island favourite builds on the flavour and texture of pumpkin, tender beef, and delicious dumplings. Filled with hearty ground provisions such as yams and sweet potatoes, this makes a make a filling family dinner.
It may be the middle of summer right now, but there’s never a bad time to eat this hearty and delicious soup! Saturday dinners at my house growing up usually involved a large stock pot of this pumpkin beef soup boiling on the stove top (and due to the size, you knew you’d be eating leftovers for days).
The main ingredient in this soup is the pumpkin. Not just any pumpkin–Jamaican pumpkin, a squash variety also known as calabaza or West Indian pumpkin. This winter squash is boiled down until it starts to dissolve in the soup which gives it it’s rich orange colour.
Combined with an array of tasty of root vegetable pieces (or provisions as they’re usually called in the Caribbean), along with common Jamaican spices such as thyme and pimento seeds, this soup is definitely something that would make a perfect meal for a filling family dinner.
If you can’t find some of the provisions in this recipe, feel free to swap them out. In the past I’ve added eddoes (one of my favourites), cassava, dasheen (taro), and chocho (chayote). You can use as much or as little as you like, but just be aware to make sure that there’s enough water in the pot to boil it all in.
Much of the flavour comes from the beef, onion, herbs and spices, but you also want to make sure you use some soup mix or bouillon cubes with this soup to help round out the taste. I usually use two packages of Grace’s soup mix (either Pumpkin or Cock flavoured varieties, or a mixture of the two). There’s noodles in these packets, so if you’re not a fan, you can strain it out as it’s first dissolving in the soup, or boil the soup mix in a tied cheesecloth to keep the noodles separate.
Is there anything that is a must-have in your Pumpkin Beef Soup? Let me know in the comments!
Jamaican Pumpkin Beef Soup
Ingredients
- 450 grams boneless stewing beef cut into small chunks
- 650 grams Jamaican pumpkin cut into small chunks
- 1 medium onion diced
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 large potato peeled and cubed
- 2 medium carrots sliced
- 1 tsp salt
- 3 sprigs fresh thyme
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 stalk scallion or green onion bruised
- 5 pimento seeds
- 1 Scotch bonnet pepper
- 1 large Jamaican sweet potato peeled and sliced
- 2 packages pumpkin beef or chicken soup mix
- 3 litres water (approx. 12 cups) divided
- 1 tsp ground black pepper
For the spinners/dumplings:
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup cup water more if needed
Instructions
- Bring 2 litres of water to a boil in a large stock pot.
- Add pumpkin, beef, onions and garlic to the pot. Stir and cook partially covered over medium-high heat for 45 minutes.
- Mash some of the larger pieces of pumpkin in the pot with a fork. Add in the carrots, potato, and yam.
- Stir in the salt, thyme, bay leaf, green onion, pimento seeds and Scotch bonnet pepper. Pour in the remaining 1 litre of water and bring to a boil.
- Reduce heat to medium and continue to cook for 15 minutes.
- Stir the sweet potatoes, soup mix and spinners.
To make the spinners/dumplings:
- In a medium bowl, mix together the flour and salt.
- Gradually pour in enough water while stirring with your hand or a fork until it forms a stiff dough.
- Pinch off a small portion of the dough and roll in your palms into a long, tapered shape and drop into the boiling soup. Cook for 15 minutes.
- Add ground pepper and more salt if needed to the soup to taste.
- Remove thyme sprigs, scallion and Scotch bonnet pepper before serving.
Notes
- When it comes to the scallion or green onions, you want to bruise it before adding it to the pot, in order to help release more of the flavour into the soup. You can do this my hitting it with a blunt object on a cutting board, or use the back of the knife blade.
- The pumpkin is what gives the soup it’s colour, so you want it to dissolve into the soup as it cooks. Chopping it up small before adding it into the boiling water will help with this. You can also opt to blend some of the larger, cooked pieces in a blender and then add it back into the boiling soup.
- Jamaican sweet potato cooks quickly, so this is why it’s added near the end of the cooking process to prevent it from dissolving into the soup.
- The ground provisions you use is up to you. Feel free to mix and match, but just be aware that some cook more quickly than others.
- If you can’t find packaged soup mix, you can use 2-3 bouillon cubes. You can also use chicken or beef stock, just omit some of the water that is called for in the recipe.
- If you don’t want noodles in your soup, you can hold a mesh sieve half-submerged into the boiling soup as you add in your soup mixes. Stir slightly until the dry stock is dissolved. Then you can lift up the sieve to remove the noodles.
- The Scotch bonnet pepper will add some extra heat and flavour to your soup if it bursts due to overcooking. If you like the heat, then just prick it with a knife before adding it to the soup, or add it in earlier so it breaks down.
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