Southwestern Butternut Squash Soup

About this butternut squash soup recipe, here's what you must know: it's simple, flexible, and full of amazing flavor.

And while that alone is enough, it also comes from a wonderful cookbook, Susie Middleton's The Fresh & Green Table, a kind and timely gift from my sister-in-law Lucy. Of course, it seems as though every recipe claims the three points listed above, but here's why this one genuinely deserves bragging rights.

Simple: Can be made in about an hour with minimal prep and clean up

Flexible:  Absolutely ok to swap squash with sweet potato

Flavor: With ancho chili, cumin, coriander, cocoa, apple cider, lime & yogurt, you get sweet & tangy & southwestern deliciousness.

Just cooking this soup, will bring major compliments your way!

And, as the photo indicates, southwestern butternut squash soup is great in a thermos for school, especially the day after you get your braces tightened.

Adapted from The Fresh & Green Table by Susie Middleton

Ingredients
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground ancho chili
1/2 teaspoon unsweetened cocoa
1/2 teaspoon sugar
kosher salt
1/4 cup apple cider (not apple juice)
1 teaspoon low sodium soy sauce
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons butter
1 large yellow onion, roughly chopped
1 1/2 pound butternut squash, peeled and cut into 3/4 inch chunks. If using sweet potatoes, aim for same overall weight and cut into similar size.
1 large clove garlic, minced
1 apple, peeled, cored, and cut into quarters
1/4 cup 2% or full fat plain yogurt. Non-fat isn't as good.
1/4 teaspoon lime zest
juice from 1/2 of a lime

In a small bowl, combine the dry ingredients, coriander through sugar, plus 1 teaspoon salt, and set aside.

In a large soup pot or dutch oven, heat the olive oil and butter over medium heat. Add the onion and 1/2 teaspoon salt, stir well and cover, cooking for about 8 minutes until onions are tender and starting to brown. Add chopped butternut squash and another 1/4 teaspoon salt to the onions, stirring to combine. Cover again and cook until the squash is softened, about 12-14 minutes. The squash doesn't have to be completely tender since it will finish cooking once the liquid is added. While the squash is cooking, however, be sure to stir occasionally and scrape the bottom as the squash begins to brown.

Uncover the pot and add the minced garlic, combine and let cook for about 30 seconds.  Add the dry spice mixture  and stir well. Next, pour in the apple cider and soy sauce. Stir once more, scrapping up browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the apple quarters and 5 cups of water, stir and bring to a boil. As soon as you reach a good boil, reduce the heat and let the soup simmer for 20 minutes.

Let the soup cool for 10 minutes or more before you puree. You can use a blender or food processor, but my favorite soup tool is an immersion blender*. Good results and much easier clean up! If using a standing blender or food processor, work in small batches to puree the soup. If you have an immersion blender, puree the soup in your soup pot, chasing down all pieces of squash, apple, and onion.

Whisk in the yogurt, lime juice, and lime zest. Taste again and add a bit more salt if you think it's needed.

If soup is too thick, add some additional water or apple cider to thin. If soup seems too thin, simmer to reduce and thicken. The soup can be made earlier and reheated as the flavor just gets better.

Serve in warmed bowls with grilled cheese if possible.

*We had a very nice Kalorik immersion blender, but someone placed it in the dishwasher and it is no more. Now we have a robust Cusinart version that works perfectly–and will not visit the dishwasher.

Winter Soups

If there isn't an old saying that you can never have too much soup during a long winter, then there should be. This seems like a basic truth and we happily honor it as one in our house. In fact, this recipe is really a soup template, moving in many directions based on your tastes and the contents of your kitchen. We love every variation we've tried, because soup always brightens a bleak winter day. And, after tremendous over-indulgence during the recent holidays, this recipe is simple and healthy.

Perhaps the secret to this recipe's success is pureeing roasted sweet potatoes or butternut squash into chicken broth to create  the soup's thick base. No heavy cream or buttery roux needed. This recipe makes much soup, but you can cut it down easily. Even better, freeze a pint or two to re-heat on another dreary day. There is always more than one of those each winter.

Ingredients
Oven Roasting
2 large sweet potatoes or 1 whole butternut squash ( If using the easier-to-handle, pre-peeled squash, buy two halves)
olive oil
kosher salt

Aromatics
2 carrots
2 celery stalks
1 red bell pepper
1 teaspoon oregano or cumin or thyme
2 cloves garlic

6 cups chicken broth (canned is fine) - may need a bit more or less, so have about 4 cans on hand
roasted chicken (rotisserie chicken  or 2 baked chicken breast)
Thai rice stick noodles

Pulling It All Together
Oven Roasting
Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. Peel and roughly chop your sweet potatoes or butternut squash into 1 inch cubes. Place on baking sheets covered with tin foil and sprayed with PAM. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with a pinch or two of kosher salt. Toss gently to cover all pieces with olive oil and salt. Roast for about 30 minutes. Take a peek every 10 minutes or so, using spatula to move & flip pieces a bit to brown evenly. When the sweet potatoes/squash are nicely carmelized, remove from oven and set aside.

Aromatics
While roasting is taking place, dice the peeled carrots, celery, and red pepper. Place all in large soup pot with 2 tablespoons olive oil. Set heat to medium, cover with lid, and start "sweating" veggies to release their flavors (this is where the term aromatics comes from). Also add your seasoning. Recently, we used 1 teaspoon of dried oregano and about 1/2 teaspoon cumin, but be creative and add whatever you like. After about 7 or 8 minutes of sweating veggies, add 2 cloves of finely chopped garlic, re-cover pot, and sweat for an additional minute or two.

Broth
Pour about 6 cups of chicken broth over softened veggies. Also add your roasted sweet potatoes or butternut squash. Stir and bring to a boil. Then simmer gently (uncovered) for 5 minutes. Turn off heat and use an immersion blender* to puree. As you puree these larger pieces, the soup will begin to thicken. You will also puree some of the aromatics and that's ok. You can make this soup as thick as you want by pureeing more or less.  We like to leave some veggies whole to add texture to the soup. You can also add more chicken broth to thin or simmer soup uncovered to reduce and thicken.

Finishing
You can stop here & enjoy. However, we usually  throw in some shredded, cooked chicken. A small rotisserie chicken works perfectly or  bake two chicken breasts (skin on and bones-in) in advance. Give soup another few minutes of heat to allow the chicken to warm completely. Another idea is to add some very skinny rice stick noodles (available in Asian food section). Smash them up a bit to shorten and make easier to eat, then cook another 10 minutes so noodles soften.

Taste and add kosher salt and black pepper as needed.


* If you don't have an immersion blender, you can place the oven roasted sweet potato or squash in a blender or food processor with a bit of broth. Then pour pureed mix back into soup pot. 

Molly's Potato Leek Soup

Resourcefulness is to cooking as improvisation is to jazz. Both arts are better off because people don't always follow set rules. As a cook, you may not have, or even like, an ingredient, so sometimes you must adapt or you'll drive yourself crazy.

This soup is the perfect example. At home, we make the adapted version of Robert Irvine's Potato Leek Soup provided below. Our version is very close to his, though I cut down on the leeks because leeks are outrageously expensive and use dried thyme because I find dried thyme taste just as wonderful as fresh in this soup.

Molly wanted to make the soup, but had major supermarket challenges and natural student budget constraints. She decided to skip leeks altogether, as well as the thyme and bay leaf. She bumped up the oniony-ness with an extra onion and added 1/ 4 parmesan cheese for more depth of flavor. Then, she packed on the pepper for extra zip. Though I wasn't there, the reviews were VERY, VERY good. A new soup is born!

6 potatoes, peeled and cut into large pieces
3 leeks, whites only, thoroughly washed
3 stalks celery, roughly chopped
1 medium onion, peeled and quartered
1 bay leaf
2 quarts chicken stock
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
4 ounces (1 stick) melted butter
1 cup light cream, 1 teaspoon dried thyme, 1 teaspoon salt and pepper

In a large pot, place potatoes, leeks, celery, onion, bay leaf and chicken stock and bring to a boil, about 15 minutes. Continue to boil until potatoes are soft. Mix flour and butter in small bowl to make a roux for thickening the soup. Add the cream, thyme, and salt and pepper. Remove bay leaf. Using an immersion blender (or in batches in a blender or food processor), blend soup until smooth. Pour into a medium pot and simmer for 20 more minutes until soup has thickened and serve.

If you cook some broccoli until it is just done, chop & add to the soup, you'll love the taste and feel more virtuous. Plus the color is wonderful.