Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Recipe-- Heather! You HAVE To make this!

I'm a fall lover. I'm a soup lover. This has been one of my favorite meals to consume this season.
I was tempted to hide the recipe away in a safe and call it my own "Secret Recipe"-- but, ... it's not my own secret recipe-- it's a recipe from an apple farm called Mac's Apples in New Hampshire. A place where we used to faithfully pick apples as children and feed the pond ducks. Thanks Mac, ... this soup is a gift.

Butternut Squash and Ginger Soup

Ingredients
1/4 C veg oil
1 each med onion, roughly chopped
3 each med sized carrots, rough chopped
1 T fresh ginger, peeled roughly chopped (or 1 tspn ground ginger)
2 lbs butternut squash, peeled in 2 " chunks
1 qt chicken stock or broth
2 each bay leaves
1 tspn salt
Frshly cracked pepper to taste
1 C heavy cream
2 oz. whole butter

Method:
Sweat (cook without coloring) oniion, carrot, ginger and bay leaves in oil. Add squash, chicken broth and salt. Cover and simmer 25 min. Remove bay leaves. In a blender or food processor, puree all ingredients. Return to heat; add cream. Add pepper and whisk in butter just before serving. Garnish with roasted squash seeds.

Variation:
Replace 1/2 C of Cream with Cider.

*Depending on the starchiness of squash, adjust consistency with extra broth.