Roasted Acorn Squash Soup with Fresh Parsley

It's been a fridge-cleaning kind of day, and since I found a few more acorn squash left over from last fall's farm deliveries, I decided to try my hand at acorn squash soup. Cooking from the top of my head–without a roadmap, so-to-speak–is always a bit more challenging. Frankly, though, how hard can it be to combine a few simple ingredients and turn them into soup? It's always fun to see what the outcome of a few more-or-less educated guesses on combining ingredients might be when I don't follow a recipe. So, here are the steps I took today and, may I say, the soup ended up being very tasty.

Roasted Acorn Squash Soup with Fresh Parsley

Ingredients:

approximately 4 cups roasted acorn squash

2-3 Tbsp. olive oil

2 cups diced sweet onions

1/4 tsp. dried thyme

4 cups chicken stock (or vegetable broth for a vegetarian version)

1/2 cup fresh, minced Italian parsley

salt & pepper to taste

Preparation:

To roast the squash, preheat oven to 400˚F, cut squash in half length-wise, scrape out seeds, brush the outside with olive oil and place on a lightly oiled baking sheet, cut side down. Bake at 400˚F for about 30-45 minutes, until the squash is soft. Let cool and scrape the flesh out of the skins.

In a large deep sauté pan or Dutch oven, heat olive oil and sauté onions and thyme until the onions are translucent. Add the squash and chicken stock and mix well. Heat over medium-low heat for about 20-25 minutes. Add about 1 to 1 1/2 tsp. sea salt and pepper to taste. Turn off the heat and add the fresh parsley. Mix everything well. Take about half of the mixture and purée in a blender until smooth. Mix with the remainder of the soup and serve. Number of servings: about six.

Clean and Green Start

It's the beginning of a new month and after all the indulgences and heavier food of the last couple of months, the beginning of February has me all fired up about lighter, cleaner, greener fare. So the motto for this month's cooking will be: clean and green.

With that in mind, I started the family off with a great breakfast smoothie this morning. According to them, it was my best smoothie ever and completely dairy-free. Here's what I blended this morning:

Best-ever Breakfast Smoothie

Ingredients:

12 oz. fresh strawberries, washed and hulled

1 1/2 medium bananas (fresh or frozen)

1 large orange, peeled

1 cup water

Preparation:

Add all the ingredients to a high-speed blender and blend for 30 seconds or until smooth and creamy. Pour into glasses and enjoy. Yield: approximately 4 cups or 32 oz.

Variation:

Many times I like to add 1-2 Tbsp. of freshly ground flax seeds and 1 Tbsp. of wheat grass powder. If you add flax seeds, add a little more water, too, since flax seeds will jell the smoothie slightly.

Apple-Orange-Banana Smoothie

When I grew up, my mom's favorite fruit salad consisted of apples, oranges and bananas. I don't remember her ever dressing the salad, but just cutting up the fruit and tossing the chunks to mix them well. The orange keeps the bananas and apples from turning brown, so it's a salad that is not only healthy, but also looks lovely. After the morning walk with the buddies, I made a smoothie based on my mother's fruit salad combo. It is very tasty and quickly blended.

Apple-Orange-Banana Smoothie

Ingredients:

1 banana

2 apples

2 oranges

8 oz. orange juice (freshly squeezed is particularly nice)

1/2 cup low-fat yogurt

2 Tbsp. freshly ground flax seeds

Preparation:

Wash all fruit well and cut into large chunks. Put all ingredients into a blender and blend on high for about 30 seconds, or until everything is smooth and creamy. The recipe makes about two 16-oz. servings.

Fresh Pumpkin Pie

This fall we joined a CSA (community supported agriculture), a local farm that delivers a bushel box of organically grown produce every other week to a drop-off location nearby. With the last batch of vegetables we also received a so-called "dessert pumpkin." It's a small pumpkin, very cute, about 5 1/2 inches in diameter and weighing approximately three pounds. It has served as a great centerpiece on our kitchen counter, but now it's time to turn it into pumpkin pie.

I have to admit that pumpkin pie has never been my favorite dessert, and I usually pass it up for apple pie on Thanksgiving Day. Also, I've never made pumpkin pie before, not even with the canned variety. So at first I was a little leery. But the good thing about getting produce from a farm and not knowing what's in the box is that you learn to cook with foods you would never think of buying in the supermarket. I honestly have to say that making pumpkin pie from a fresh pumpkin has taken me to new heights in baking. I really like the taste of the pie, too. I guess you could say I had a pumpkin pie conversion experience…

Before being able to use the pumpkin flesh, I had to cook it. I settled on baking it because it is a very simple method.

Baking a Pumpkin

Ingredients:

1 pumpkin, approximately 3 pounds (makes about 2 cups of pumpkin purée)

olive oil (pure olive oil is more stable at higher temperatures, so use that!)

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 350˚F. Wash the pumpkin and cut in half lengthwise. Scoop out the seeds and keep them for roasting later. Brush a cookie sheet or roasting pan with oil and place pumpkin halves on it, cut side down. Cover with foil and bake at 350˚F for about 60-90 minutes or until very soft. Scrape the flesh out of the rind and purée in a food processor or food mill.

The next step involves making the actual pumpkin pie:

Pumpkin Pie

Ingredients:

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg

1/4 tsp. kosher salt

1/4 tsp. ground ginger

1/4 tsp. ground cloves

3 large eggs

2 cups fresh pumpkin purée

1 cup whole milk

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 375˚F. Prepare your favorite crust (home-made or store-bought) and line a pie pan with it. Set aside. Combine sugar and spices, add the eggs and beat until mixture is creamy and light-colored. Add pumpkin purée, then milk, and mix until everything is blended well. Pour this filling into your favorite crust recipe and bake for about 35-45 minutes, until the center of the filling is set, but still quivery when nudged. Let pie cool on a rack. It can be served cold, at room temperature or slightly warm. Serve with whipped cream.

Note: The baking instructions are given for conventional oven baking. I used a convection oven, but it still took my pie 35-45 minutes at 375˚F.

Biscuits and Gravy

When we go to Finland–Finland, Minnesota, that is–we always make sure that we have breakfast at Our Place, the restaurant in this town of 400+ people on the North Shore of Lake Superior. It is the local hang-out where people gather to watch football or baseball and where you get a good breakfast, lunch or dinner without feeling robbed. On Saturdays and Sundays only, the restaurants serves the best biscuits and sausage gravy you can find anywhere according to my husband. With the weather turning colder and our appetites increasing for more substantial fare, I gave making biscuits and gravy a first try today. I received a two-thumbs-up approval rating from my husband with the words that I can make that again. Be warned though: This is not a recipe to make if you're watching your waistline.

Biscuits and Sausage Gravy

Ingredients:

12 oz. Jimmy Dean Sage breakfast sausage

4-6 Tbsp. butter*

4-6 Tbsp. all-purpose flour*

1/2 tsp. kosher salt

1/4 tsp. black pepper

4 cups whole milk, warmed

Preparation:

Cook sausage in a large skillet over medium heat, breaking it up into small chunks, until it is no longer pink. Add butter and heat until melted. Add flour, salt and pepper and cook and stir for a few minutes until everything is blended well. Heat milk in the meantime. Gradually add the milk, stirring constantly. Bring mixture to a boil, reduce heat and cook for a few minutes until the sauce is thickened. Serve sauce over bicuits. Makes 4-6 servings.

*Tip: If you like your sauce rather thin, use less butter and flour without changing the other measurements. If you like it a little thicker, go for the full 6 tablespoons of butter and flour!

A Potato-Fennel Gratin Fit Enough For Company

The best-tasting potatoes–obviously–can be had in fall when they're harvested and the stores are brimming with a large variety of different kinds and sizes. I made the following recipe for a potato-fennel gratin tonight for guests and it was a hit with everyone. The recipe is almost exactly taken from Ina Garten's The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook.

Potato-Fennel Gratin

Ingredients:

2 fennel bulbs

1 yellow onion, halved and thinly sliced

2 Tbsp. pure olive oil

1 tbsp. unsalted butter

2 pounds potatoes (russet or Yukon Gold)

2 cups heavy cream

2 1/2 cups grated Gruyère cheese (1/2 lb.)

1 tsp. kosher salt

1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 350˚F and butter an 9x13-inch casserole dish. Remove the stalks from the fennel and cut the bulbs in half lengthwise. Remove the cores and thinly slice the bulbs crosswise. Sauté the fennel and the onions in the olive oil and butter on medium-low heat until tender.

Peel the potatoes and slice them thinly, about 1/8 inch thick. Mix the sliced potatoes in a large bowl with 2 cups of cream, 2 cups of Gruyère, salt and pepper. Add the sautéed fennel and onion and mix well.

Pour mixture into the prepared casserole dish. Press down to smooth the potatoes. Sprinkle the top with about 1/2 cup of grated Gruyère. Bake uncovered for 1 1/2 hours, until the potatoes are very tender and the top is browned nicely. Allow a few minutes to cool and set before serving.

The recipe makes about 10 servings and can be made days ahead of time and reheated at 350˚F for about 30 minutes. (Let the gratin come to room temperature before reheating. If not, the time for reheating needs to be increased.)

Butternut Squash and Sweet Potato Gratin

Oh boy! Here is an indulgence that I made for the dinner table tonight, and with something like this on the menu I say, "who cares about dessert? Let's have seconds instead!"

With plenty of butternut squash and sweet potatoes on hand and tired of making yet another pot of soup, I found a recipe for butternut squash and sweet potato casserole on the blog Pinch My Salt that I liked because of its simplicity, wonderful photography and great directions. The only changes I made from the original recipe were cutting the salt by one third, using dried instead of fresh thyme, and adding more garlic. Here's the decadent recipe that will fill your kitchen with great smells. Even my 13-year-old daughter, who was doing homework at the kitchen table while listening to her iPod, looked up at one point and said, "Mmh! Something smells good, mom!" Here's my slightly adjusted version of Pinch My Salt's recipe:

Butternut Squash and Sweet Potato Gratin

Ingredients:

1 lb. butternut squash, peeled and sliced about 1/8 inch thick

1 lb. sweet potato, peeled and sliced about 1/8 inch thick

1 tsp. dried thyme

1 generous tsp. kosher salt

fresh pepper to taste

2 cups shredded Manchego (or Gruyère–or even aged Gouda)

3 cloves garlic, pressed

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 400˚F. Butter a 9x13-inch casserole dish and set aside. Peel and slice butternut squash and sweet potatoes, grate cheese, and measure spices and heavy cream.

In the buttered casserole dish, spread half of the butternut squash out and sprinkle with 1/3 of the salt, pepper, thyme and 1/2 cup of cheese. Then spread half the sweet potatoes as the next layer, again sprinkling with 1/3 of the salt, pepper, thyme and 1/2 cup of cheese. Repeat layering with another layer of butternut and sweet potatoes. Finish by mixing 3 cloves of freshly pressed garlic with the heavy cream and pouring it over the dish. Sprinkle with the remaining 1/2 cup of cheese, cover the casserole and bake in the oven for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, remove the cover and bake 20 minutes more until the top is nicely browned. Remove the gratin from the oven and let it cool for 15-20 minutes before serving. Enjoy!

Note: Supposedly, this recipe makes 12 servings, but we live in Minnesota and it's getting cold outside, so we only get 6-8 servings out of this recipe. Oink, oink. :)