AL ROKEER SAID HE LIKED IT

By some weird freak of nature I ended up with a couple of butternut squash plants in a part of my garden where nothing had been planted.  Winter squash needs a longer growing season than we have here on the east side of Idaho so I let it grow more as a ground cover.  Still, the unusually warm fall allowed my squash to mature.

 I really like baked butternut squash, but I was looking for another way to use my bounty of big orange vegetables so when I saw Matt Lauer and his guest stirring up the ingredients for Butternut Squash Soup, I decided to give it a try.

 The method of cutting the squash vertical before peeling was a good idea.  This squash hadn’t had time to form a really hard skin so the first step was easy.

 I liked the colors of all the vegetable ingredients and it was an interesting and fine idea to include chunks of a granny smith apple to add a bit of tartness.

 I put the apple, squash and other vegetables in my big, deep sauce pan, added the olive oil and sautéed them as instructed in the recipe I found on the today.com/food website.

 When the vegetables were caramelized and turning a golden color I added the chili powder.  I didn’t have any low sodium vegetable broth so I stirred up some onion soup mix, then sprinkled in the sage.

I brought the mixture to a boil and then simmered it until the squash was soft.

Since there was the option of having chunky soup or pureed, I saved some out and sent the rest through my blender.

 Before I served it, I stirred in the cream.  Then I tasted it.  

Well….it was better than the orange squash glop I hid in my milk carton at my grade school cafeteria, but it came pretty close to the canned baby food I poked down my kids when they were too little to know better.  Even when we added picante sauce to overcome some of the blandness, it wasn’t real appetizing.  I told DH he didn’t have to pretend to like it.  He declared, “Not my favorite,” and had another grilled cheese sandwich.  This may be one soup we will sacrifice to the sink gods.  Now that I think about it, Al Roker’s verdict was pretty noncommittal, “Perfect butternut soup weather.”

 http://www.today.com/food/dress-easy-butternut-squash-soup-crispy-sage-leaves-t50246