What is with the pumpkins?

Answer 1

A pumpkin is a squash fruit, usually orange in colour when ripe. Pumpkins grow as a gourd from a trailing vine of the genus Cucurbita Cucurbitaceae. Cultivated in North America, continental Europe, India and some other countries, as well as in English cottage gardens, Cucurbita varieties include Curcurbita pepo, Cucurbita maxima, Cucurbita mixta, or Cucurbita moschata all plants native to the Western Hemisphere. The pumpkin varies greatly in form, being sometimes nearly globular, but more generally oblong or ovoid in shape. The rind is smooth and variable in colour. The larger kinds acquire a weight of 40 to 80 lb (18 to 36 kg) but smaller varieties are in vogue for garden culture. Pumpkins are a popular food, with their insides commonly eaten cooked and served in dishes such as pumpkin pie; the seeds can be roasted as a snack. Pumpkins are traditionally used to carve Jack-o'-lanterns for use as part of Halloween celebrations.

Botanically it is a fruit, referring to a certain plant part which grows from a flower. However it is widely regarded as a vegetable in culinary terms, referring to how it is eaten.

Answer 2

Most Halloween pumpkins are used for Jack-o- Lanterns. Jack-o-Lanterns are pumpins that are hollowed out and have been carved. These pumpkins usually have a candle placed inside of it to let it glow.

Answer 3

A large, edible, orange-yellow fruit borne by a coarse, decumbent vine. Cucurbita pepo, of the gourd family.

Traditionally, the pumpkin is used in Halloween traditions, as a jack-o-lantern, and a decoration.

Answer 4

Scientifically, a fruit is the mature ovary of any flowering plant.

By this definition a pumpkin is a fruit, and so is a cucumber, a green bean, a tomato, an apple, the whirligig "keys" produced by a maple tree, a bell pepper and a chestnut, along with many hundreds of other things that form on plants after a blossom has been pollinated.

In common (non-scientific) language, most people would call a pumpkin a vegetable even though it is closley related to a watermelon, which most people would call a fruit. Generally speaking - and at the risk of repeating myself from an earlier question - if a kid will not eat it, it is usually called a vegetable.

The term "vegetable" has little meaning in the field of botany, but great meaning in the field of nutrition, since it includes not only the "fruits" of many plants, but also the leaves, roots, seeds, tubers, stems and flowers, depending on the plant in question. For instance every part of the dandelion plant and the radish plant is edible from the roots to the blossoms.

Answer 5

It is a tradition, like Easter eggs and a Christmas tree.

Answer 6

Suspect Peter, No last name appears to have eaten these gourds as well as imprisoned his wife in one.

Answer 7

Pumpkin Seeds

Answer 8

A vegetable and a squash.

Answer 9

it is used as a lantern