Give Store-Bought Pasta Sauce A Creamy Fall Makeover With One Canned Ingredient

When you don't have a lot of time but you want to make a pasta that tastes like it was thoughtfully prepared, there might be a solution sitting in your pantry: canned pumpkin puree. Pumpkin puree can do a lot in making a pasta sauce creamier thanks to its thick and smooth texture. It's mild enough not to overpower everything, but it's also a little earthy and sweet, which works well with the other flavors you might already add to your favorite pasta sauce. And pumpkin can actually add a lot of body to a sauce without requiring cream or cheese, which is pretty impressive work for the world's spookiest produce.

It's all about adding the right amount. Start with a few generous spoonfuls of plain pumpkin puree, stir it into your prepared sauce, and taste before adding more. The idea is creamy sauce, not pumpkin soup, so add it sparingly as the sauce is warming, giving it some time to blend in. If you're tempted to make pumpkin puree from a pumpkin yourself, that works too, but the canned version is considerably easier for a weeknight meal — just make sure you're buying pumpkin puree and not sweetened pumpkin pie filling.

While marinara and simple Alfredo sauce are good places to start when mixing pumpkin puree into pasta sauce, they aren't the only options. Pumpkin even works nicely with vodka sauce, or in creamy mushroom sauces where its earthy flavor makes a lot of sense alongside the earthiness of mushrooms, garlic, and herbs. You can use it to bring some creamy texture to a meaty tomato sauce such as Bolognese, or if you want to keep it plant-based, blend pumpkin puree with soaked cashews, nutritional yeast and garlic for a fully vegan cream sauce. For an especially savory version, try stirring in miso paste (which, no, isn't just for soup) so that all that salty, fermented umami can give the pumpkin some extra depth.

There are some places it does not work, however. Pesto is one example: The thick puree will only work to dull the bright flavors from basil, garlic, and cheese. You want to throw it in among flavors that you already know work alongside pumpkin and we're not talking about pumpkin spice here. Instead, pair it alongside ingredients like sage, rosemary, thyme, chili flakes, Parmesan, and nutmeg. The resulting sauce shouldn't taste like some kind of pumpkin-themed novelty dish; it should still taste like pasta sauce, just a little creamier, richer, and maybe that little bit more autumnal.