Butternut Squash and Apple Bisque from Food Truck Road Trip

The weather is decidedly soupy here - I'm not making much ice cream, but I am baking cookies and cooking soups and stews. So when I saw that there was a soup recipe available for blog publication from the cookbook Food Truck Road Trip, I decided that was what I wanted to make.

I've made plenty of butternut squash soups before, and they're all a little bit different. This one includes apple butter and citrus juice and zest along with the more typical ingredients.

Oh! And there's brown sugar, too, which was a bit of a surprise to me. I can't say that I've made a whole lot of soups that included sugar of any kind.

But - this isn't a sweet soup. Not a dessert soup. The brown sugar adds that hint of molasses and a tiny bit of sweetness, but that's offset by the added brightness from the citrus. It's really well balanced.

I thought the soup's presentation in the book was interesting - served in a jar - but in the end I preferred eating it out of a bowl, although a mug would have been just as nice.

This recipe calls for blending the soup in a standard blender, but I used a stick blender instead. It does the job well, and there's no need for transferring batches of hot soup in and out of a blender.

Butternut Squash and Apple Bisque
SAVOR SOUP HOUSE—ADAM DUNN AND COLLEEN SCHROHT—PORTLAND, OR
From Food Truck Road Trip by Kim Pham, Philip Shen, Terri Phillips
Printed with permission of Page St. Publishing

On a cold winter day, nothing can spread that warm glow like a good bowl of soup. “This is a super simple comfort food that’s nice to come home to,” says Adam Dunn. “It can be made relatively quickly, and it’s a great way to relax and warm up.” Rich, creamy butternut squash is brightened up by sweet apple butter and citrus zest.

Serves 5

1 large butternut squash
Olive oil, for coating
Water
1 large yellow onion, diced
4 tbsp (56g) butter
1 1/2 qt (1420ml) vegetable stock
8 oz (227g) apple butter
1/4 cup (61g) cream
2 tbsp (25g) packed brown sugar
Zest and juice of 1 lemon, or to taste
Zest and juice of 1 orange, or to taste
Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 375°F (190°C, or gas mark 5). Halve and seed the butternut squash and place skin-side up on a baking pan. Coat the squash lightly with olive oil, add a dash of water to the pan and bake for 45 minutes; this helps separate the skin of the squash for easy peeling.

Sauté the diced onion in the butter in a medium pot over medium heat. Add the vegetable stock and apple butter and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.

Once the squash is done, scoop out the flesh and add it to a blender along with the onion mixture, cream, sugar, lemon and orange zests, salt and pepper. Add the lemon and orange juices to taste. Blend until all the ingredients are thoroughly smooth.

Giveaway is OVER.

Yum

Hot-Wing Style Delicata Wedges

This is Angela, from Seasonal and Savory, sharing one of my favorite seasonal produce recipes: Hot Wing-Style Delicata Wedges. My cooking is heavily influenced by what I find at the Farmers’ Market or in my weekly C.S.A. share, and the winter squash are coming on strong right now. Delicata squash are a wonderful winter squash option because the thin skin does not need to be removed before eating.  That makes them ideal for slicing and roasting, and in this recipe I have spiced them up with a sriracha sauce.

Serve with blue cheese dressing for dipping, and you have a fun and healthy appetizer or side dish.  Adjust the amounts in the sauce according to the heat level you prefer.  I cut the squash both crosswise and lengthwise and then scooped out the seeds and sliced the quarters into small wedges. 

Hot-Wing Style Delicata Wedges

2 medium Delicata squash, seeds removed and cut into small wedges

5 tablespoons salted butter, melted

4-6 tablespoons sriracha, or preferred hot sauce

1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika

Your favorite blue cheese dressing, for serving

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Spray a cookie sheet with cooking spray to coat. Arrange the squash wedges on the tray, spaced slightly apart and with the skin sides down.

Stir together the melted butter, sriracha, and smoked paprika, and brush the mixture on each of the wedges.  You should have some of the sauce left over. 

Roast for 30-40 minutes, or until the squash is tender when pierced with the tip of a knife and the edges are just started to brown.  Brush the warm Delicata wedges with any remaining sauce, and serve hot, with blue cheese dressing on the side. 

Thanks for reading,

Angela

Yum

Simple Seasoned Squash

It time for the December contest at Kitchen Play, this time sponsored by MySpiceSage.com. I'm really late with getting an entry up, but what the heck, might as well have some fun now that I'm done with the holiday madness and I have some time off to play around in the kitchen. This is my first entry for this month's contests. I might get another one up before the week is over. Yes, I admit it, I've become a contest junkie.

Did I mention that these Kitchen Play contests are pretty simple? You just pick one of the recipes, make it as-is or change it up, whatever you prefer. Then blog about it and post a link to your blog post on Kitchen Play. Unlike some contests, you don't lose the rights to your recipe. And, gee, you just post on your own blog, so if you're stuck for inspiration on what to post, these can help you brainstorm a bit.

Oh yeah. And there are prizes. Those are nice, too.

I decided to riff off a recipe for Spicy Pumpkin Soup Shooters. My first riff was that I didn't make a soup. Second, instead of pumpkin, I used fresh winter squash. After all, pumpkin is a variety of squash, and to be honest it's easier to find good winter squash than it is to find a decent baking pumpkin. After I was done riffing, I used some (but not all) of the same spices as were in the original soup.

I chose a delicata squash because it's small. One squash makes two small servings. Just enough for a side dish with dinner, without feeling like you've over-squashed yourself.

This recipe is fast, since the squash is cooked through first in the microwave and then baked with the spices and a bit of butter to brown it a bit. You could bake it all the way in the oven, if you've got the time. Or, if you've got no time at all, skip the oven and nuke it again after adding the butter and spices.

Simple Seasoned Squash

1 delicata squash, cut in half lengthwise, seeds removed
2 teaspoons butter
Seasonings, to taste: coriander powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, paprika, salt, pepper

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Place the squash, cut side down, on a microwavable plate or baking dish. Add enough water to cover the bottom of the plate. Cover with plastic wrap and microwave on high until the squash are cooked through - about 10 minutes.

If the plate/dish you used for microwaving is also oven safe, you can use the same dish. Otherwise, use a small baking sheet or pan. Place the squash cut-side up and put 1 teaspoon of butter into each squash half, spreading it over the surface. Sprinkle the squash with the seasonings, and place in the oven. (If you're using a Pyrex dish, you should have a little water in the bottom of the dish - it's not recommended to bake with them completely dry.) Bake for 10-15 minutes, until the squash browns a little.

You can microwave and season the squash in advance and refrigerate them until you're ready to bake. They'll take longer to bake - figure about 15-20 minutes for them to warm through and get a little brown.

Yum

Cheesy Spaghetti Squash

Spaghetti squash and I have a long and sordid history. I first discovered it when I first left the parental nest and struck out on my own. Spaghetti squash was being touted as a great alternative to spaghetti, and I fell for that line. So I tried to serve it the same way I served spaghetti - with spaghetti sauce.

It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't all that good, either. It wasn't real spaghetti, and it wasn't a good use of the vegetable. So, for a long time, I ignored it.

When I rediscovered spaghetti squash, I looked at it a whole different way. I stopped thinking of it as a pasta alternative and started treating it like a vegetable. That doesn't mean I don't use sauces when they're appropriate. But they're sauces that complement the squash.

One of my favorite ways to eat it is with simple browned butter and sage. But this time I tried something completely different. I had about a cup of cheese sauce left over from some steak sandwiches I had made. The sauce was pretty simple. I started with a roux, added milk, then added colby cheddar cheese.

For the squash, I cut it in half, put it cut-side down on a baking sheet and cooked it until it was done, then scooped it out. I had the cheese sauce reheated in a pan, added the squash, and stirred to coat it with the sauce. It needed a bit more salt, then I added some white pepper, and that was it.

Cheese isn't the first thing you might think of with squash, but it worked really well with the spaghetti squash. For sure I'd make this again.

Yum