Butternut Squash: Two Ways

This week I was blessed with a trio of my favorite magazines in the mail: Food Network, Real Simple and Taste of Home. I pore over these - scrutinizing the facts, drooling over pictures and prioritizing recipes. With this new arsenal of ideas and our first real trip to the grocery store in months (wedding craziness = lots of low-maintenance dishes) I added three meal plans to our week involving butternut squash.

Only recently have I started experimenting with butternut squash (bns), with this yummy little soup here.

We enjoyed this winter veggie minestrone and I felt compelled to try more bns dishes, especially those that highlighted its flavor and texture more. This trio of  recipes turned out to be wonderful dishes that were full of a sweet, nuttiness that somewhat resembles that of a sweet potato or pumpkin but is still unique.

 However, my one lesson going from a soup made from pre-packaged, cubed bns to buying my own whole squash is that these things are bitches. I don't use that word lightly, I seriously thought the prepping of this thing was going to kill me. So be forewarned, that while the packages in the produce section are exponentially more expensive, they may be worth the extra investment, especially if you are not comfortable with your knife skills or don't have the proper tools in your home. 

Here are some tips that I've commandeered and corrected from an old Real Simple infographic:

1. Cut around 1/2" off of each ends of the squash using a heavy chef's knife or serrated knife - BE CAREFUL. 
2. Cut the squash between the large knob and the neck, then scoop out the fibers and seeds from the knob. If you have a grapefruit spoon, use it because the fibers are hard to get out. 
3. Peel using a STRONG vegetable peeler. If you're confident in your knife skills you may be able to use a knife to peel it. 
4. Slice each portion (knob and neck) in half lengthwise and then slice into the shapes/sizes needed.

Note: this isn't particularly easy, and please be careful with your fingers. The flesh of the squash is very hard and the peel is tough as well. 

Thankfully, I will be able to use one, 3+ pound bns for all of my recipes this week. I prepped to step 3 then would cut the specific amounts/cut styles for each dish. I stored the unused portion in an airtight container in the fridge and it held up really well (I highly recommend these plastic containers). 

Thus far into our week, we've only tried two recipes and I'll share them with you all now, with an update as soon as we try our bns puree with pork chops later into the week. 

Both of these recipes would be great options for a Meatless Monday and won't ruin your 2014 diet - each dish clocks in at less than 500 calories with whole grains, fresh produce and delicious cheeses. 

First, I made a butternut squash penne. I am a pasta-person - I love pasta dishes with complex layers that warm you up on a cold evening. Too often, however, such pasta dishes also weigh you down with heavy cream sauces stuffed with cheese. This dish features a sauce made only of the oils in which the veggies were cooked and pasta water - which certainly saves calories, but also adds a depth of flavor. 

This dish was also incredibly easy to prepare - bns prep aside - and would be easy for a weeknight meal. All of the vegetable cooking takes place while the pasta is cooking, so you're done within 15 minutes. If you're of the pre-prepping sort, cutting your veggies and storing them ahead of time will save you even more time!

The squash cooks down to be soft,without being mushy and caramelizes a little in the pan. It is sweet and nutty without being overpowering. The sauteed mushrooms compliment that sweetness with a creamy flavor and texture. Using a red onion adds a signature tangyness and spiciness that blends well with the red pepper flakes (it's even spicier in leftovers!). You could make this dish vegan - but I think the Parmesan adds necessary salt and the stringy cheese thrill that I associate with pasta. 

Butternut Squash Penne (adjusted to feed two)

Ingredients: 

6 oz. whole-wheat/multigrain penne (pick a variety with lines, they pick up sauce better)

1 T extra virgin olive oil

1 c. diced peeled butternut squash (about 4 oz.)

freshly ground pepper

6 oz. mushrooms, sliced

2 cloves garlic, minced

1/4 small red onion, minced

1/8 - 1/4 t red pepper flakes (to taste)

1/2 c shredded Parmesan cheese

1 T fresh oregano

Method:

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the pasta and cook as the directed to al dente. When draining, reserve 1/2 c of the water. 

Meanwhile, heat 1/2 T olive oil in a large nonstick skillet over med-high heat. Add the squash, pinch of salt and pepper. Cook until tender and lightly golden brown - at least 5 minutes - tossing occasionally. Transfer to a dish and set aside. 

Add the remaining oil, mushrooms, with salt and pepper. Saute until the mushrooms are lightly browned - around 4 minutes. Add garlic, onion and red pepper flakes. Cook, stirring until the onion has softened. 

Add the pasta, squash and half of the reserved pasta water. Cook, stirring until warmed through. Stir in half of Parmesan, add additional water to loosen. Stir in oregano. Top with remaining cheese. 

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Secondly, I tried a dish that I described to Jordan only as "funky pizza." This pizza is quick and easy - another great option for weeknight dinners (and makes a wonderful breakfast). Pizzas are also wonderful dishes to make with kids. If you take care of the knife work, you can give them the chance to decorate their own pizza canvas. This recipe doesn't include any pre-cooking, so they can do it all! They'll take pride in what they've made and will eat it - veggies and funky cheese included. 

I am not afraid of bold flavor and I love things that resonate with an explosive combination of flavors. The salty, (for lack of a better word) funky Gorgonzola and the bold red onion is softened only slightly with the creamy bns. The rosemary comes through with a subtle woody, floral flavor and the crust is a perfect, neutral base. The walnuts could be left off for those with allergies, but if you can help it - leave them on. The contrasting textures and buttery flavor of the walnuts take this to the next level. 

 We paired ours with a simple salad of mixed greens, apple, onion, leftover Gorgonzola and Caesar dressing. But, it's good on its own and made a wonderful reheated breakfast. 

"Funky Pizza"

Ingredients:

1/3 c butternut squash (about 2 oz.) sliced thin

1 T olive oil

1/4 small red onion

1 t dried rosemary

raw pizza dough (I used a Pillsbury crust, you could use 3/4 pound dough if your grocer sells it - if you choose that option, stretch/roll it on a cornmeal dusted surface)

4 oz. Gorgonzola cheese (2/3 c crumbled)

1/2 c walnut pieces

Method:

Preheat oven to 450. Place dough on a baking sheet sprayed w. non-stick cooking spray. 

Toss the bns, rosemary and onion in a small bowl with olive oil. 

Crumble the cheese and sprinkle it evenly over the dough - leaving a a 1" perimeter. Scatter the bns and onions on top evenly. 

Bake until the cheese is melted and the crust is almost browned - around 11 minutes. Scatter the walnuts over the pizza and bake until lightly toasted - 2 minutes. 

Slice into 8 servings.

Skinny Baked Potato Soup

This recipe combines (at least) two of my favorite things: full-flavor soups with a healthier twist and freezer-friendly meals.

Both of these themes tie in well with this week's events. We're getting married in seven days (!!) and thus have been so busy that finding time to cook has been nearly impossible; and yet, for our bodies' sakes we need to take it easy on the fast food and eating-on-the go.

I was originally drawn to this dish because I love cauliflower and experimenting with it. It has such a wonderful texture and such a mild flavor that you can dress it up with almost anything you'd like, and make it taste decadent without compromising your figure. And in this recipe, you do just that. This soup is creamy and thick with all the flavor and wonderfully smooth texture of a loaded baked potato soup - and yet there's almost equal parts cauliflower to potato and not a drop of cream. With the right toppings, this meal could be not just meatless, but vegan! And before toppings, this soup is only 137 calories per serving (of which it makes ten).

This six-ingredient recipe (not including oil)  is incredibly inexpensive considering it makes ten servings - even assuming you keep nothing on hand other than oil or salt, it'd be less than $1/serving. I usually make a big pot on the weekend and serve us each a bowl for dinner and then freeze around three quarts of it for later.

I love freezer meals because they theoretically allow you to spend time cooking when you have it and then merely have to reheat a meal later when you're short on time. Admittedly, some frozen meals aren't worth the trouble - you have to thaw them days in advance, cover with foil, cook at this temperature then rotate and do "finishing" steps with crusts etc. But this soup is truly a breeze. I usually pull it from the freezer the morning I intend to serve it for dinner and leave it in the fridge. That evening, all I have to do is dump it in a pot and reheat. I also include a quick re-blending in the food processor or with the immersion blender just to make sure all of the ice crystals are broken up uniformly.

And as for the toppings - add anything you'd normally put on a loaded baked potato or cream of potato soup. I usually opt for a generous swirl of Cholula hot sauce, green onions and cheddar cheese; and bacon crumbles if we have them on hand (duh!). It would also be delicious with a little chili on top and some corn chips or by itself, too. And any little crunchy add on - like croutons, creates a dynamic texture. It's truly a blank canvas - it has rich, simple flavors like mashed potatoes, but could be built upon in any direction you'd like to venture.

If you're looking for a comfort food that won't spoil your new year's resolutions, an awesome alternative appetizer for your Super Bowl party or a great time saver for the work-week dinners, give this recipe a try. It's a winner.

Skinny Baked Potato Soup

Ingredients:

1 T olive oil

1 large onion, sliced

1 large stalk celery with leaves, roughly chopped

1 large clove garlic, minced

1/2 large head of cauliflower (6-8 c), stem removed and roughly chopped 

6 c starchy potatoes (like russets) peeled, roughly chopped (same size as cauliflower chunks)

5 c vegetable or chicken stock

1 1/4 t salt (more to taste)

Method:

In a large pot heat oil over medium heat. Add onions and lower heat slightly. Saute 5-6 minutes or until softened, but not fully transparent. Add celery and continue to cook for a few minutes until celery is softened. Add the garlic and cook for one minute. 

Add the cauliflower, potatoes and stock. Bring to a boil, reduce to simmer and cover. Cook for 15-20 minutes until potatoes and cauliflower are fork-tender. 

Remove from heat and cool slightly if using a blender. Use blender or immersion blender to blend the soup until as smooth as possible. You can add water or stock to thin out your soup as needed. 

Serve hot with loaded potato toppings like chives, green onions, cheese or bacon crumbles. 

Taste-Test:mberry Miracle Fruit Tablets

We are now of that age where when friends come to town or a celebration is called for, we're not longer interested in or able to go out for an all-night bender full of booze, psychotropic drugs, dancing and rough housing. Instead, we have game nights and taste tests. Go ahead, laugh, but last night's taste test adventure was truly mind blowing.

A few weeks ago, we ordered a 14-count pack of mberry tablets. These dissolving tabs are made from synsepalum dulcificum, commonly known as miracle fruit. The berry, native to West Africa, contains a glycoprotein called miraculin which "plays an active role in altering how the mind perceives tastes.(It)...coats the taste buds, temporarily modifying their shape, which causes the taste receptors to interpret certain flavors differently." Which means that after eating miracle fruit (or dissolving an mberry tablet on your tongue) foods which normally taste sour or bitter will taste sweet.

Last night, while visiting friends we brought a platter of tart and distinctively sour foods to eat with our tablets.  We brought strawberries (famed by mberry users to be the ultimate taste-test), lemons, kiwis, pomegranate seeds, salt and vinegar chips, hot sauce and fresh jalepeno (though mberry has limited, if any effect, upon most spicy food), sour cream, granny smith apples and dill pickles. We also scrounged through their kitchen and added red onion, pickled ginger, Parmesan cheese and shots of apple cider vinegar.

I, myself, am guilty of mis-using the phrase "taste-test" to describe trying that isn't particularly new to me like a restaurant's take on a well-beloved dish, this is more like "sampling" - where you give something a go just for the hell of it. Traditionally "taste-test" means trying something new without any concept of what it is or how it should taste. 

Our taste-test was of the purest form but with the added twist of being completely disorienting. Mberry suggests that you use your tablets at a "flavor tripping party" - and that title is not for dramatic effect - because you are eating very familiar foods that look and smell the same as always, however, their flavors are completely different. 

The granny smith apple, is one of the most tart, drool-inducing varieties of apple. But after the mberry, theses slices tasted like any sweet red delicious apple. The pickles still had the flavor of dill, but had lost their pickled-twang. Nick commented that he'd never realized how sour pomegranate seeds normally are until he ate them with the tabs and they were almost flavorless. And the kiwi almost lost its tart distinctiveness by becoming indistinguishable from any other sweet fruit. 

It was hard enough wrapping our minds around the fact that we no longer knew what food should taste like, but we also realized how involved the rest of our body is in distinguishing flavor. All the foods still smelled the right way and the highly fragrant and acidic items - like chips and vinegar - still affected other parts of our mouths and throats. We threw back shots of apple cider vinegar and on our tongues it tasted like sweet cider or juice, but our throats, cheeks and soft palates still felt the tingle and burn. 

The three runaway successes were the lemon, strawberries and sour cream. As a child, I found the easiest way to eat strawberries was with a cup of sugar to dip them in. With the mberry, they tasted exactly like that saccharine childhood snack; and as Kristen pointed out, as an adult it's almost too much sweetness. The lemons tasted like the most perfected lemonade and we ate them like oranges - sucking all the juice and savoring their pulp. And the sour cream was like a deflated whipped cream - and anything dipped in it, from fruit to chips, was made even more sweet and creamy. (On that note, remember that despite it all tasting good in your mouth, some combinations may not sit well in your stomach - like large quantities of sour cream and pickles). 

The strength and length of effects of the tablets vary from person to person but last between 15 minutes to two hours; and the only way to tell is continue sampling food to see when your normal sense of taste returns (again, be careful with eating large quantities of funky stuff!). 

This was a great experience and so much fun for us. For a few bucks a person we were able to have our minds blown and experience food euphoria - much less expensive and drastically safer (the only ingredients are miracle fruit powder and cornstarch) than indulging in other items we could dissolve on our tongues for fun! I highly recommend this product for a disorientingly great time with friends or the most whimsical diet plan ever - why eat chocolate cake when you could have an mberry and lemon?  

My Most Epic Post Yet: Soup vs. the Polar Vortex

Now parts of the US are experiencing and preparing for an extreme cold snap. The Polar Vortex, as dubbed by one scientist, will bring incredibly cold temperatures which in some areas may be 30 degrees below zero (with wind chill bringing it down even further)! In our area, we are expecting a high tomorrow of 15 and a low of -4.

In North Carolina - and probably other Southern places - talk of cold and snow causes a run on  bread and milk, a panic I have never understood. Personally, if I'm fearing frigid temperatures and preparing to be stuck at home, I want comforting foods that are easy to heat (especially without electricity) but still delicious. To this end, I've been making soup and our weekly menu plan features another soup recipe and Jordan's chili.

Yesterday, which was especially cold in the morning, inspired me to make a try a new vegetable soup recipe - winter vegetable minestrone. This recipe was an easy-to-make one pot meal. This recipe takes advantage of the wonderful produce available in wintertime; but you could easily swap out some of the more seasonal vegetables (like butternut squash) for an alternative (potatoes, for example) any time of year. For example, I was unable to find Savoy cabbage at my local market but swapped it out for Napa cabbage; you could use any easily tenderized greens, like spinach, too.

Minestrone is is a traditional tomato-based Italian soup brimming with vegetables and usually pasta in a mild broth. I am used to - and generally prefer - soups with more bold broths/bases, so this soup read as somewhat gentle in flavor. However, with that light broth, you're able to taste and appreciate each vegetables texture and unique flavor. If you're looking for something more bold, you could use low-sodium chicken or vegetable broth instead of water.

This soup is also quite healthy and would be the perfect dish for a Meatless Monday meal. Weighing in at a little over 300 calories per serving, this soup fills you up without compromising your waistline. And obviously, it is visibly full of vitamin-rich vegetables that are good for the whole family. If your children are picky eaters, it might be a hard sell to convince them to eat an all-veggie soup. However, the simplicity of this dish makes it a great kid chef-friendly soup that they can make themselves (they'll need some knife and stove supervision but that's it). And when children take ownership of their nutrition and food preparation, they're proud of what they've cooked and much more likely to eat and enjoy their meals.

With a piece of warm, crusty bread this soup is sure to fill you up, satisfy your appetite and warm up your whole body. I hope you all keep safe and warm during this impending winter storm and enjoy something delicious that protects you from the cold, heating you from the inside out. We will be inside with mugs of soup!

Winter Vegetable Minestrone

Ingredients:

1 medium onion, chopped

1Tbsp. salt

1/2 tsp. black pepper

2 Tbsp. olive oil

1 Tbsp. minced garlic

1, 14.5 oz. can diced tomatoes

1 small butternut squash, peeled and cubed

3 medium carrots, peeled and chopped

1, 15 oz. can navy beans, rinsed

1, 3" piece of Parmesan rind (ask at the deli counter, they usually have leftovers for cheap)

6 c water

1/2 c small pasta shells (or any mini pasta like bowties or elbows)

1/4 chopped Savoy (or Napa) cabbage

Method:

Cook onion with salt, pepper and garlic in olive oil over medium heat, stirring frequently, for 8-10 minutes until the onion is soft. Add tomatoes and their juice and simmer 6-8 minutes until thickened. Add squash, carrots, beans and Parmesan and water. Simmer until vegetables are fork-tender, about 20-25 minutes. 

If you intend to serve all of the soup (4 servings) at once, add your pasta. However, if you anticipate leftovers and eating on this for several meals, cook enough pasta (1/8 c per serving) for the immediate meal and add it at the end. If you add your pasta now and package it for reheating later, the pasta will absorb too much liquid and become bloated and mushy. If making ahead for a later meal, stop here then add the cabbage and pasta when reheating later. 

Add cabbage and simmer until pasta is tender (if cooked in the soup) or 6 minutes. Remove the remains of the rind.  

Serve topped with grated Parmesan and warm, crusty bread. (I used an "everything" topped French bread, drizzled with olive oil and broiled just until crispy on the outside).