Ingredients

• 1 kg pumpkin weighed with skin*
• 1/2 onion
• 1 tablespoon butter or olive oil
• approximately 2 - 3 cups vegetable broth
• pinch of saffron threads

Mushrooms for serving:

• 200 g mushrooms (fresh or frozen forest mushrooms such as bay boletes, chanterelles, porcini, golden chanterelles)
• 1 tablespoon butter or extra virgin olive oil
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 tablespoon fresh thyme

Preparation

1. Bring broth to a boil with saffron. When cooking broth for this soup we can add a few pieces of dried mushrooms to it. Wash pumpkin, remove seeds, trim skin, cut into 1.5 cm cubes.
2. In a wide and larger pot melt butter or heat oil, add diced onion and sauté it for 1 minute. Add pumpkin, season with salt and brown well on all sides. Pour in 2 cups of vegetable broth (or in such amount to completely cover the pumpkin) and bring to a boil. Scrape any light browning from the bottom. Reduce heat, cover pot and cook covered for about 15 minutes, until pumpkin is completely soft.
3. Blend soup into smooth cream. If needed thin with more broth. Serve hot with mushrooms and thyme.
4. Mushrooms: clean and if necessary rinse, drain thoroughly, cut into pieces. In a pan melt butter or heat oil, add mushrooms and on higher heat sauté them stirring occasionally until lightly browned. Season with salt and pepper, mix with thyme.