For those tired of all the sweet fall recipes (I have a weakness for baking, what can I say? 🙂 ), I am excited to bring you a fun savory fall recipe! These pumpkin sloppy joes are a delicious twist on a classic meal that I’m confident you will love. The sauce is made with just three main ingredients (plus a few spices!) and this meal is entirely in one pan which makes clean up a breeze. I hope you give these pumpkin sloppy joes a spot on your dinner menu this week!
I’ve probably mentioned this before, but I honestly have to say some of the recipes I’m most proud of on the blog are savory recipes. Probably because cooking doesn’t seem to come as naturally to me as baking. Not to mention, baking ideas come to me ALL. THE. TIME. There’s so many variations of muffins and quick breads, baked oatmeal, pancakes, cookies, ice cream, etc etc. Confession: sometimes my Sunday meal prep looks a lot like this this. LOL. I never am short on sweet breakfast, snack, and desserts…BUT sometimes my dinner meal prep is a little lacking.
These pumpkin sloppy joes are a meal that tastes just as good the next day! While I haven’t done this yet, I also am guessing it would be very freezer-friendly too so you could make a double batch and freeze half for a later time. I’m thinking I need to do that myself here soon!
Let’s talk a bit more about what ingredients you’ll need to make these pumpkin sloppy joes!
Base ingredients for Pumpkin Sloppy Joes
Ground Turkey
I personally used ground turkey to make these pumpkin sloppy joes! I love how it’s a leaner source of protein than beef, and with all the flavors from the sloppy joe sauce you definitely aren’t missing anything by using ground turkey. That being said, you can definitely use ground beef or ground chicken in place of the turkey if you want!
Mushrooms
Now I have to say, when I was initially thinking up this recipe I didn’t plan on adding mushrooms. However, when I was at the grocery buying all the ingredients to prep this I noticed some mushrooms…and thought I’d add some extra veggies by finely chopping up mushrooms! While I don’t have kids so can’t verify it’s kid-friendly, I do have a husband who dislikes mushrooms and he happily ate these pumpkin sloppy joes (including leftovers) and never once noticed the mushrooms! Success. 🙂 all this to say, if you strongly dislike mushrooms, feel free to just simply omit them (noticing your sloppy joes might be a big more “saucy.”
Onions and Garlic
Diced onions and freshly minced garlic are cooked with the ground meat and mushrooms until fragrant and tender, and add depth of flavor to these sloppy joes. Feel free to use garlic powder (I’d suggest 1 teaspoon if using garlic powder) instead of fresh garlic if that’s all you have on hand.
Ingredients for Pumpkin Sloppy Joe Sauce
Pumpkin
You will need ½ cup of canned pure pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling) for this delicious sloppy joe sauce!
Apple Butter
The ½ apple butter provides natural sweetness to the sloppy joes. Many traditional sloppy joe recipe rely on ketchup to add sweetness, but I used this sugar-free homemade apple butter (link) I posted last year in the recipe! I love how this recipe is very freezer-friendly. You could also use store-bought apple butter, or even try pumpkin butter.
BBQ Sauce
My two favorite BBQ sauces are this homemade BBQ sauce (link) which is 100% naturally sweetened using fruit juice versus added sugar. I also was recently introduced to this BBQ sauce (link to Stubbs) and love it’s so low in added sugar. It’s rather surprising how much added sugar is in many store-bought (or even homemade!) BBQ sauces. The combination of pumpkin, apple butter, and BBQ sauce might seem a bit strange…but just TRUST ME on this one. 🙂
- 1-1¼ lb ground turkey or beef
- 1 medium onion, diced (about 1 cup)
- 2 cups diced mushrooms, optional
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tablespoon oil
- ½ cup pumpkin
- ½ cup apple butter (could sub pumpkin butter)
- ½ cup BBQ sauce
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon pepper
- 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
- ½ teaspoon chili powder
- Optional: sliced green onion, for serving
- In a large skillet, add oil of choice and heat over medium heat.
- Add in diced onion, garlic, mushrooms and saute for a few minutes until softened.
- Add in ground turkey (or meat) and cook until no longer pink and completely cooked through.
- Add in pumpkin, apple butter, BBQ sauce, salt, peppers, smoked paprika, and chili powder and let simmer on low heat a few minutes.
- Serve with your favorite buns, over sauteed greens, or even plain!
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