Mini Pumpkins Stuffed with Lamb and Wild Rice

One of the few things I'm going to miss about where we're stationed now is this little Amish farmer's stand that sets up every Saturday with the most amazing fruits and veggies.  Now that Fall has arrived they've started having my favorite thing in the world, Fall squash!  I got a whole box of assorted squash for $5.00 and miniature pumpkins for $.50 each.  The mini pumpkin is one of the greatest things ever in my opinion.  Most people think of them as decorations, but they're a wonderfully versatile food.  Last year I came across this recipe for stuffed pumpkin shell potatoes, which I originally was going to make again but then I decided to get creative instead.  I had some wonderful Minnesota wild rice that we'd gotten from the boy's other Grandma, Julie, last time we saw them and a package of ground lamb in the freezer and a plan began to form.  I prepared the wild rice, which is nothing like the regular rice you get in the store - one cup of uncooked wild rice makes almost 4 cups of cooked rice and it never gets gummy or otherwise funky.  While the rice was cooking (it takes about 45 minutes) I prepared the pumpkins for roasting.  These pumpkins are larger than the  "mini" pumpkins, but not as big as a sugar pumpkin (the smaller jack-o-lantern type pumpkins) so I thought they'd be perfect for the meal I'd planned.  Preheat the oven to 350 and slice the tops off the pumpkins then use a spoon to scoop out the insides without piercing the shell.  Using a paper towel rub down the inside of the shells and the bottom of the "lids" with a little olive oil, then lightly dust with salt and garlic pepper and place on a cookie sheet and put in the preheated oven for 15-20 minutes - just enough to start them softening, but not done all the way.  While the pumpkins are roasting I diced one small onion (also from the Amish stand) and a clove of garlic started cooking them in about 1 Tbsp of olive oil.  As soon as they began to get soft I added the ground lamb and browned all of it together.  By this time the rice was cooked and I added about 2 cups of the cooked rice to the meat mixture and cooked together for a few minutes.  Next I retrieved the pumpkins from the oven and placed about one tablespoon of feta cheese crumbles in the bottom of each bowl then filled the bowls with the lamb and rice mixture and placed the tops back on and put them back in the still warm oven for 30 minutes.  The finished product was a wonderfully filling fall treat that even the baby loved!

(note:  the pictures I'm using on here were never meant for this, they were only snapshots I took with my phone to send to a friend that I was telling about what I'd made!)