Food is a big part of every holiday in my family, and while I have many favorites, dinner-in-a- pumpkin stands out as especially fitting Halloween feast.  A fun, festive, and delicious meal to fuel your little trick-or-treaters, here's my aunt's famous recipe for this Halloween meal:

Dinner in a Pumpkin
1 small to medium pumpkin                    2 TBSP.Soy Sauce                           
1 onion chopped                                 1-1/2 cups cooked rice
1-1/2 or 2 lbs. ground beef                  2 TBSP. brown sugar
1 can cream of mushroom soup               

1(8oz.) can water chestnuts-drain&chop                      

1 can or fresh sliced mushrooms 
Wash pumpkin. Cut off top and clean out seeds and pulp. Scrape out any strings of pumpkin and rinse out pumpkin with water. Can draw a face on the pumpkin with a permanent marker. Poke a few holes with a knife in the outer shell of the pumpkin. (steam will escape and it will cook faster)
In a skillet, saute chopped onion in a little oil or butter until tender. Add the ground beef and brown. Drain well.Add soy sauce, brown sugar, mushrooms, any vegetables, and soup. Simmer a few minutes to blend everything together. Stir in cooked rice add chestnuts.. (we like to use the long grain sticky rice or Japanese rice-Botan Brand)

Spoon meat mixture into the hollowed out pumpkin. Put lid on pumpkin and place on a foil lined cookie sheet. Make sure the top of the pumpkin does not touch the broiler part of the oven, or the top of the oven. You may need to move the rack down.

Bake @350* for 1-2 hours depending on size of pumpkin. Pumpkin is done when you can easily insert a knife or a fork. Scoop out meat mixture and also the pumpkin that is inside. Put butter and brown sugar on the pumpkin that has been scrapped off the inside skin. Enjoy!  You can also serve banana squash or other types of squash with this as well.

Serve with green beans and a roll, or a dinner salad.