How to Make Butternut Squash Soup

Male: Hey, welcome to Gardenfork. Today, I have the dog’s attention because of the ball. Today on Gardenfork, we’re going to make a squash soup and we’re going to use butternut squash that we got out of the garden. These are some Big Max Pumpkins, which are also part of the squash family. And I’m kind of losing -- I’m trying to here but I really like squash soup. It’s really simple to make. It’s just squash and some other ingredients and you cook them down. It’s really simple and that’s what I like and here, alright. I just have to release that tension there. Anyway, it’s fall here. I mean, as you can tell the leaves are down. I really like how the pumpkins look in the yard. These guys, they got kind of like double of freckles on them because we had a bunch of hard for us. They were all one color and then they got kind of pimply but I guess it’s just kind of it what it is. So for the soup, we want to add a little sweetness at golden rot. I love golden rot, and they’re trying to swim in her tub and it’s cut with ice. So for our soup, we want to have a little bit of sweetness and apples work really well for that, and this is our other apple tree. It’s without a couple of hard frost and it’s still has the apples on the tree but their just now ready. So well, they are usually ready but these are good. They’re like, they’re really crispy and sweet and they’re really cold so your teeth hurt because it’s almost freezing out here. But these are big and we’re going to pick a bunch of this and put them in the soup, alright. And here we go. Okay. Let’s start with, you need butternut squash. This is some of the squash that I grew in the garden this year. And this is probably one of the easiest things as I grew in the yard this along with the pumpkins. These were kind of a happy accident, I bought some plants from the nursery and I just kind of threw in medicine and after I thought and then all a sudden, I was clearing out all the vines and I found the bunch of these. So they’re kind of –they’re like the secret surprise. This is about a pound and a half, so what we’re going to do is we’re going to peel this thing with that of a regular carrot peeler and then we’re going to slice it in half and scrape up the seeds. Sometimes pulling back on it does a better job but you want to get down to the orange. You don’t like this kind of white layer and you want the orange layer. Magic knife, cut off the ends and then do this carefully. I cut this in half, alright there we go. So I scoop the stuff out, these are the seeds. Any questions Charlie? Charlie: Can you do anything with the seeds like pumpkin seeds? Male: You probably could. You probably could roast them, I didn’t think of that but you just did. And I cut them like that so you get little cubes. It’s fine. Okay, so onion makes me cry. We’re going to put the onion in with some butter in our pot. We’re just going to cook the onion down a little bit and then we’re going to throw the squash. We’re going to throw in some stalk and something else that I’m forgetting, but I wrote it down. So you’re thinking a professional kitchen like mine, we’d have butter but I forgot the butter. So I’m going to use some olive oil instead. It’ll -- a bit kind of the same, just a little les rich but we’re going to put some cream out in the end so that’ll rich it up pretty much. Charlie: No, I don’t think you want those. Male: You want the onion chopped pretty small, you know I don’t dice it. I said dice before or not but it just depends on how kind of lumpy you want in your soup. The bigger the onions, the bigger they’re going to be in the end product but just once this cooked down, we don’t want them like goldenie, sweetie but we just them cooked down a bit and then we’re going to put squash in. So while it’s cooking down, you want to chop up your apples. I think I might slice, not slice, skin them. I’m going to pick the skin off, what’s it called? When you de-skin it. What’s that called when you take the skin off the apples? Peel. Male: Peel. Male: Yeah. Big word. Well, that’s kind of peeled. So our onions or what we call it translucent. I’m going to put in the squash, as you can tell no one’s around to help me. Charlie’s out and leaves again. I don’t know why he leaves. I usually just move him over. Put our apples in here. By the way, this is going to be a vegetarian dish. It’s a vegetarian squash soup. Is it ovo-lacto or vegan, it’s going to have a cream in it so that’s -- but you know it’s a healthy non-meat dish. Let’s just call it that and a squash is just a dine healthy, it’s -- I will always loved it like just some big sweet potatoes with some broccoli for dinner or something like that. It’s just, I don’t know the orange stuff, it means it has a lot of carotene in it, so that’s always a good thing. But I like this, this is just kind of a winter favorite in our house, really simple to make. So I like to just cook the squash in here. I should have put the squash in before I put the apples in. But I like the apples, I mean the squash to get a little bit of carbonization on it. Just a little bit of the bark bits. It just kind of sweetens it and gives a little more of a roasty feel. Okay. The last one that goes in this, this is an organic vegetable broth. This stuff is just ubiquitous now. You can get really nice cooking broths in a regular store now which is nice and this is an organic rant. We got it one of the big stores but I’m going to put in four cups, which I think is, I think that’s a cork. Its is. Okay, so we’re at the part of the show where we get to use power tools in the kitchen and I like that of course. Our soup has been cooking. We’ve been out raking leaves and stuff. But here, the squash is done when you can put a fork through it. And that, see how that just breaks up? That’ very nice and it smells great in here. This is a hand blender that Charlie got me and Charlie is nicely run in the camera today in raking leaves as well. And he had an important safety tip for using this. Charlie: Absolutely. You want to put that in the liquid before you could turn it on or you could sprain yourself with boiling hot squash. Male: That’s a good point, so we’re going to put this -- just don’t turn it on and put it in but stick it in and then turn it on, alright ready? Charlie: Yup. Male: So you can blend this too however, if you want it like silky smooth or you want a little chunks in it. Charlie: And we have paramedics standing by. Male: Yeah, the paramedics standing by. The finishing ingredient. Turn the heat of, hold on. That you will cream, but we’re only going to use a little bit. This is eight ounces. Charlie: And we stick in it. Male: No, this will kind of smooth it out. A little taste here, this ones kind of hot. Charlie: Yes, that was freaky hot. Male: Yeah, that’s hot, aw! But this is really good. I like this. I think I put a little bit too much cream on it but I put a little less cream in, maybe four ounces which is half a cup. Was that eight ounces there in a cup? Anyway, I wouldn’t put half of the cream in but this is great and it’s super nutritious. I like it kind of chunky like this but you can smooth it out. And then I’m like, I can’t stop sticking my tongue but that’s still hot but it’s still really good. And this is like, its pretty dark in it with a little bit of the cream in there. You can go of half the cream and the rest to be supposed, I put half the cream. Alright, so you go, it’s really simple. You can take some apples and some squash, onion, a little bit of milk, put it all together, blend it up and you got a meal. And you can freeze this, you can put it in the fridge, whatever you want and it’s great. Alright, so that’s our episode for today. Please tell your friends about the show or send us an email, tell us what you like, what you don’t like, you can sign up for our weekly email newsletter and you know, make it a great day, alright. I’ll see you later. Visit our community forum The Greenhouse ask and answer questions post pictures and videos http://thegreenhouse.gardenfork.tv eric@gardenfork.tv 2007 all rights reserved