Steps to make pasta with pumpkin and cream cheese sauce

• To prepare the pasta with pumpkin and cream cheese sauce, first take the pumpkin, clean it well by removing the seeds inside, peel it, and cut it into small pieces, or if you find it in supermarkets, you can take the pumpkin already cleaned and cut.

  

• Also clean the shallot, finely chop it and put it in a non-stick pan with some extra virgin olive oil. Heat the oil and cook the shallot for a couple of minutes on low heat, then add the pumpkin, rosemary sprigs, sage leaves, salt, pepper, and sauté it for about 5 minutes. Stir the pumpkin occasionally so that it absorbs well with the other ingredients.

  

• Then add 1/2 glass of water and continue cooking for another 10 minutes with a lid until the pumpkin becomes soft. In a pot, pour water and coarse salt and put it on the stove. When it comes to a boil, pour in the pasta and cook it for the minutes indicated on the package. You can choose the type of pasta you prefer; in this case, I chose mezze maniche rigate. Drain the pasta, and if you want, set aside a bit of cooking water useful to soften the sauce. In my case, no cooking water was needed; the sauce was very creamy, but it depends on personal taste.

  

• When the pumpkin is nice and soft, remove the rosemary sprigs and sage. Pour it into a jug and blend it with an immersion blender together with the Philadelphia and add 1 tablespoon of grated Grana Padano. If you want, you can add a splash of the pasta cooking water that you have previously set aside.

  Drain the pasta in the non-stick pan and pour over the pumpkin and cream cheese sauce, mix well and serve hot. Everyone will love it, young and old!