Exported primarily out of Slovenia and Austria, pumpkin seed oil has a variety of uses ranging from cooking to medicine. The dried seeds of various types of pumpkins are used to produce pumpkin seed oils with various properties. Due to the nutty taste of the oil, its uses in cooking are quite diverse. In recent years, you might have seen salad dressings appear on the shelves of your local grocer. There are also ice-creams that use the oil, to add a nutty flavor.
Because of the abundance of seeds per pumpkin, and the relative ease of growing pumpkins, pumpkin seed oil can be quite inexpensive when compared to other vegetable soils, such as grape seed oil. Pumpkins can grow in relatively any soil when given the right irrigation and sunlight. Austria is the largest exporter of pumpkin seed oil, where it is used in many different dishes and desserts.
