Soup in a pumpkin!!

On Saturday, we went to pick up our first CSA share.  It was a really great experience- veggies everywhere- brought in straight from the farm- so fresh!  We brought home:  broccoli, cauliflower, collards, carrots, salad greens, sweet potatoes, turnips, even grapefruit.  Also, they had pumpkins!  Apparently the farm had a bumper crop of pumpkins this year, so they still have them around.  I must confess I have never done anything with a pumpkin, except carve it and roast the seeds.  So, I asked one of the lady's working at the CSA what to do with it, and she suggested to cook a soup in it, and that is what we did.  Sunday, my husband cut the top off and cleaned the seeds out.  Then we filled it with cut-up fresh veggies from the CSA, some ground venison, sage from our backyard, and put the top back on. We put it in the oven for 2 hours on 350 degrees.  The pumpkin seals up like a slow cooker.  It came out delicious!  Every time you ladle the soup out, you would scrap the sides and get some pumpkin, too- very good!  After dinner, we cut-up the rest of the pumpkin and froze it to use later on in soups, breads, and/or pies.  We served the pumpkin with the soup in it on the dinner table, and the boys loved it!!  It made a very nice centerpiece, too!