Pumpkin Seeds substitute

Best substitute

Sunflower Seeds

Use the same amount by volume as the pumpkin seeds you are replacing

Best for salads

Close match

Sunflower seeds swap in one for one and are the best all-round answer, especially as a topping on salads, granola or bread. Sesame seeds also work one for one and are traditional in Mexican sauces. Chopped almonds are fine if nut allergies are not the issue. But check which job the seeds are doing first, because there are two very different ones. As a topping they are pure crunch and oily richness, and almost any toasted seed covers it. In a green pipian, mole verde or a Yucatecan sikil pak, ground pepitas are the actual body and thickening of the sauce as well as its earthy flavor, and there the honest answer is that a half and half blend of ground sunflower seeds and sesame seeds is the least-bad option and will still taste noticeably paler and less earthy than the real thing.

Other pumpkin seeds substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Sesame Seeds
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by volume for sauces, ½ the volume for toppings
Genuinely traditional rather than a workaround: ground sesame is the thickener in several classic Mexican moles and pipianes, so this is a swap with real provenance.
What changes
Toast them hard in a dry pan before grinding.
Best for
pipian rojo, mole and adobo sauces, Mexican and Middle Eastern dishes, bread toppings, dressings
Excellent thickening because sesame is oily and grinds to a paste readily, which is why it works so well in a sauce. But the flavor is much stronger and nuttier with a faint bitterness, so it dominates rather than supports, and a green pipian made with sesame tastes more like a light mole. As a topping they are also tiny, so you get a crunchy coating rather than distinct bites, which is why the quantity halves. Sesame is a declared major allergen in the United States.
3Blanched Almonds
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by volume, toasted, and ground for sauces
Also a genuine Mexican technique, since ground almonds thicken a number of classic sauces.
What changes
Blanched rather than skin-on almonds keep the sauce pale and smooth.
Best for
pipian and mole style sauces, granola, crumble and streusel toppings, salads, romesco style sauces
As a thickener almonds are reliable and give a smooth, faintly sweet, creamy sauce, which is pleasant but tastes richer and rounder than the earthy savory edge that pepitas bring. As a topping they are much harder and drier with a snapping crunch rather than the soft chew of a pepita, and they are obviously not an option in a nut-free recipe. Grind them while warm from toasting, which helps them break down rather than turn to paste.
4Peanuts
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by volume, toasted, skins rubbed off
A standard thickener in Mexican cooking, particularly in encacahuatado and some pipianes, and cheap and easy to buy.
What changes
Use raw or dry roasted unsalted peanuts, not the salted bar kind.
Best for
pipian and peanut-based sauces, toppings on savory dishes, salads and slaws, noodle dishes
Great body and richness in a sauce, and the texture crushes nicely. The problem is dominance: peanut is one of the loudest flavors in any pantry, and it will take over a green sauce entirely, so what you make will taste like a peanut sauce with tomatillo and chili rather than a pipian verde. If you go this route, lean into it and add more coriander and tomatillo to push back. Not suitable where allergies are a factor.
5Sunflower Seeds Blended With Tahini
Different taste
Use ¾ cup toasted sunflower seeds plus 2 tbsp tahini for every 1 cup pepitas, for sauces only
The best approximation for a ground pepita sauce, and a small trick worth knowing.
What changes
The sunflower seeds bring bulk and thickening, and the tahini brings the oily savory depth they lack.
Best for
pipian verde, mole verde, sikil pak style dips, any sauce thickened with ground seeds
Closer than either ingredient alone, because sunflower seeds alone taste too light and sesame alone tastes too strong. It will still be paler than a real pipian and slightly less earthy, so add a spoonful of chopped coriander stalk and a roasted serrano to push the flavor back towards green and savory. Blend for longer than feels necessary, since the sauce should be silky rather than gritty.
6Toasted Rolled Oats or Panko
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by volume for toppings only
The nut-free and seed-free option for anyone dealing with multiple allergies.
What changes
Toast rolled oats dry in a pan, or panko in a little oil, until golden.
Best for
granola and crumble toppings, salads, soup and grain bowl toppings, allergy-restricted baking
Cheap, allergy-friendly and genuinely crunchy, and in a granola or crumble nobody will complain. What is missing is fat and any nutty savor, so add an extra teaspoon of oil to a granola to compensate, and expect the topping to taste plain. Both also lose their crunch quickly once wet, so scatter them over dressed salads at the last second rather than tossing them through, and do not use them in a sauce, where they turn pasty and starchy rather than silky.

What is Pumpkin Seeds?

Pumpkin Seeds is the flat, oil-rich seed from inside a pumpkin, sold hulled and green as pepitas, with a mineral, faintly earthy taste, and it does two different jobs in cooking: toasted whole for crunch, or ground into the paste that both thickens and flavors Mexican pipian and mole verde.

Cooking tips

Toast pepitas in a dry pan and stop the moment they finish popping, usually two to three minutes. They puff and jump audibly as they toast, which is a helpfully clear signal, and they go from perfectly nutty to bitter within about thirty seconds of that point. Burnt pepitas will make an entire pipian taste acrid with no way to fix it, so this is the single most important thing to get right.
Grind them while they are still warm, and grind them dry before adding liquid. Warm toasted seeds break down into a much finer paste than cool ones, and starting with a little liquid in the blender gives you a gritty sauce because the seeds skid around instead of shattering. Blitz them to a coarse flour first, then add the tomatillos, chilies and stock.
Buy hulled green pepitas, not the whole white seeds you scoop out of a carved pumpkin. The white ones have a tough fibrous outer hull that stays chewy and splintery no matter how long you roast them, and they will not grind into a smooth sauce. If you do want to use seeds from your own pumpkin, they are worth roasting whole as a snack, but they are not a substitute for pepitas in a recipe.
In a pipian or mole verde, keep the heat low after the ground seeds go in and never let it boil hard. Seed-thickened sauces split and turn grainy at a rolling boil, releasing their oil and going from silky to broken. Simmer gently, stir often, and if it does look oily, whisk in a splash of stock off the heat.
Store them in the freezer. Pepitas are high in unsaturated oil and go rancid faster than nuts do, tasting sharp and bitter, and because their flavor is subtle in the first place the rancidity is easy to miss until it has spoiled the dish. Taste one before you commit a cup of them to anything.

Frequently asked questions

Are pepitas and pumpkin seeds the same thing?

Mostly, and the distinction matters in the kitchen. Pepitas are the flat, hull-less, green seeds from specific varieties of squash, sold shelled and ready to use. Ordinary pumpkin seeds scooped from a carving pumpkin are white, encased in a tough fibrous hull, and much larger. Recipes calling for pumpkin seeds in a sauce or a granola almost always mean pepitas. If a recipe says to roast the seeds from your pumpkin as a snack, it means the white ones.

Can I use the seeds from my Halloween pumpkin instead?

For snacking yes, for cooking no. Rinse them, dry them well, toss with oil and salt and roast at 160C for about forty minutes and they make a fine snack with a chewy hull. But they will not work as a substitute for pepitas in a sauce, because the hull never softens and refuses to grind smooth, and they are wrong in a granola or on a salad for the same reason. Buy hulled pepitas for anything where the seed is an ingredient rather than a snack.

What is the best substitute in a green pipian or mole verde?

There is no substitute that tastes right, and it is worth saying so plainly, because ground pepitas are both the thickener and the defining flavor of the sauce. The least-bad version is three quarters of the pepita quantity in toasted sunflower seeds plus a couple of tablespoons of tahini, which gives you the body and some of the savory oiliness. Ground blanched almonds or toasted sesame both thicken well but push the sauce towards a different mole. Expect a paler, milder result and compensate with extra coriander, tomatillo and roasted chili.

Can I just leave the pumpkin seeds out?

On a salad, in granola, on top of bread or in a muffin, yes, and nothing else needs changing, you simply lose some crunch and richness. In a pipian, sikil pak or mole verde, absolutely not, because the ground seeds are the sauce itself and removing them leaves you with thin tomatillo salsa. If you have no seeds and no nuts at all, make a tomatillo salsa verde and serve it as that rather than trying to build a pipian without a thickener.

Should I buy raw or roasted pepitas?

Raw, if you are cooking with them. Toasting is where most of the flavor comes from, and doing it yourself in a dry pan takes three minutes and lets you stop at exactly the right moment, which matters a great deal for pepitas because they turn bitter fast. Pre-roasted salted pepitas are perfectly good for snacking or scattering on a finished dish, but a cup of them in a bread dough or a sauce will oversalt the whole thing.

Related substitutes

More nuts & seeds substitutes

Pumpkin Seeds substitute

Other pumpkin seeds substitutes

2Sesame Seeds

3Blanched Almonds

4Peanuts

5Sunflower Seeds Blended With Tahini

6Toasted Rolled Oats or Panko