GeekOrchard

Perfect for those fall evenings when it’s just starting to get chilly….I just emailed it to my great Aunt, and thought maybe I should post it here too.

I took this recipe:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/recipe_views/views/104280

And changed it to:
Roasted Butternut Squash Soup

3 lb. or so butternut squash
3 to 4 celery stalks
2 med. white onions
3 to 4 carrots
1 garlic head (Robin prefers two, I think it overpowers)
1tsp. olive oil
6 cups chicken broth (low-salt), or 6 cups water and 2 or 3 bullion cubes
1 tbsp butter
1/8 tsp cumin
1/2 whipping cream
chopped fresh sage for sprinkling on top
creme fraiche, to put a dollop on top
dash paprika or tumeric for color on top before serving

Preheat oven to 350*, Half the squash lengthwise, clean inside of gourd and rub olive oil on cut edge. Cut onions in half or quarters, and celery in half, carrots in half, and clean all the cloves from the head of garlic. In a 9×12 shallow pyrex dish with just enough of the broth to cover the bottom (depending on size of squash I sometimes end up using two), arrange carrots, onion, celery, and garlic so they will fit under the dome of the gourds and roast inside it until done (about an hour, but longer with a bigger gourd or two pans, I always divide the veggies between so there a bit of each kind under both halves of the squash). While the roasted veggies cool, prepare stockpot on low heat with broth, pat of butter, and cumin, and I tend to improvise and add a little oregano, thyme, or other spices depending on my mood.

Pour contents of roasting pans minus the gourds in the stockpot. Scoop out the interior meat of the squash into stockpot, then puree with hand immersion mixer in pot, or in parts in the blender (this way is messy if the liquid is too hot).

You can freeze it for later at this point, or turn up heat to medium, and add cream, and serve with a dollop of creme fraiche (or sour cream), chopped sage, and a dash paprika. Better the second day.

Also, you can add any/substitute other root vegetables you like (turnips, parsnips), but stay away from potatoes as they ruin the texture in our opinion, and try not to get the ratio of other veggies to squash too high. The real key is the roasting of all of them together I think, and I almost never make this the same way twice. It’s soup, so I use whatever I have fresh. The Kobucha squash or acorn is also good done this way but have a different texture, and my vegan friend adds an apple and/or a pear and uses yellow curry in place of the cumin, plus she drops the dairy altogether (including the butter) .

Last night proved that once again November rules for the best sunsets around here.

We went out and watched the sun go down, and the lights come up…

The only thing that made it better was coming inside to the smell of a homemade pumpkin pie Robin had in the oven. If you look at the view cam, it’s just not high enough res. to catch all the colors of the sunsets around here, and too bad there’s still no scratch and sniff plug-in either. I guess this will have to do until they develop the technology further.