Butternut Squash Soup - Deeelish!

My favorite new 'go to' soup these days is Butternut Squash Soup. Now, originally I used a recipe I found online and have since forgotten where I found it and have adapted with my own tweaks and touches. If you have never tried butternut squash, they are delicious, and to me they have a similar taste to sweet potatoes.

First, get yourself a butternut squash. You can either get the ones where they are already cut up into little squares in the produce section or you can get a whole one and do the chopping yourself, and save some money.  Guess what I chose?

Please be careful when peeling this sucker. It's hard to do and it has the texture of a pumpkin, seeds and all. Once you get it peeled and seeded, cut it up into little 1" squares and spread them out on a cookie sheet and coat them with olive oil, salt and pepper. Like this:

Bake the squash at 350 for about 45 minutes.  While you are waiting on the squash, either grate up a 1lb bag of carrots in your food processor, or just buy the already grated carrots. I had whole ones today, so I did the grating. Next, chop up an onion and toss the carrots and onion into a dutch oven pot that has about a tbsp or two of olive oil on the bottom (two swirls of the pot). Now here is where I hate measuring, I swear I tried, but this is the best I can do. Hopefully, you will get it and understand what I'm saying here. 

With the carrots and onions sauteeing on medium/low, I added 10 fresh sage leaves, 6 shakes of ground cinnamon, 4 shakes of nutmeg and 4 shakes of clove.  I like to use fresh ginger in this soup.

I cut off about 2 inches, scrape off the skin and use a microplane grater and grate it into the soup. Freeze the rest. Also add salt and pepper here, just enough that you think will be enough. Some people like salty, some do not.  Mix it all up in the pot. It should look like this.

Let that cook for a few minutes, until the carrots look like they are getting soft, then add about 2 1/2 cups of chicken stock.  I used homemade stock that I had made and froze.  Let this all simmer on medium/low until the squash is done.

The squash takes about 45 minutes to roast.  It smells delicioush when it's done. Be careful opening the oven and don't get a squash facial.

Add the squash and all of it's juices into the pot. Be careful not to splash it all over the place, but that is really easy to do. I know from experience.

Here's where you get to use a cool kitchen gadget, an immersion blender. If you don't have an immersion blender, go buy one! It's so fun to use, it's like a mini boat motor that you swirl around to chop everything up.  If you don't have one, you can use a blender, just do small portions until everything is chopped up and looks smooth.

Last, add about 2 cups of heavy cream into the soup. You can do this after you blend, or while you are blending, but I do it while I'm using the immersion blender. It should be a soupy consistency. Not watery, but not thick like applesauce, but somewhere in between. You can add stock to thin it, but always err on too thick, than too thin. It's easier to thin than it is to thicken.  Here's the end result in the pot. Taste it and adjust your flavors here. I added more of all of the spices for some kick.

 

If you want to fancy it up and add some awesome great finishing touches and flavor, do this.  Melt some butter, like 2 tbsp, do this over very low heat.  When the butter looks like it's browning, take some of the sage leaves you have left over and drop them into the butter.  The sage leaves will crisp up and make great toppers to the soup along with a dallop of cream cheese.  Take the sage infused butter and stir it right into the soup. It is SOOOO good!!

That's it... It is a great soup on a cold day and can fill you up for days.  I hope you enjoy!