Perfectly Toasted Pumpkin Seeds

 One of the things my family looks forward to the most during the fall season is toasted pumpkin seeds. Digging all of the glop out of the center of the pumpkin when carving jack'o' lanterns is completely worth it for a handful of these tasty treats. However, I've always felt like my toasted pumpkin seeds didn't quite measure up to my expectations, though I followed instructions from various websites to make them. A few weeks ago, I was at a going away party for one of my long time friends and another friend of hers brought toasted pumpkin seeds that were phenomenal! The following tips for perfectly toasted pumpkin seeds are gleaned from her instructions.
First, remove seeds from a pie pumpkin.The pie pumpkin seeds are smaller and tastier than those from large carving pumpkins. Soak the pumpkin seeds for 24 hours. Periodically rinse the seeds in a colander to wash off as much of the slime as possible. After the soak, drain the seeds and spread them on rimmed baking sheets. I had to put mine in a roasting pan as I currently don't own any rimmed baking sheets. The girl I talked to at the party used coconut oil and sea salt on her seeds. They were very good, but I prefer a more savory taste for my seeds, so I used olive oil and sea salt on mine. The amount will depend on how many seeds you have to toast. I used 4-5 tablespoons of oil and about 3 teaspoons of salt. I had seeds from three pumpkins, thus the large amounts of oil and salt. Stir the seeds to coat with the oil and salt.

 Toast the seeds at the low temperature of 275 degrees. It will take at least an hour to toast them. It took about 3 hours for mine to be completely toasted but I imagine using a rimmed baking sheet instead of a roasting pan would drastically cut down on this time since the seeds would be closer to the heat source in the oven. Be sure to periodically stir the seeds for even toasting while they are in the oven. They should be a nice even brown color when they are done.

Let cool or a bit and enjoy!