Dinner Dec 12, 2022
Note: I had a lot of different gourds from our CSA. They were all small or I had so few of each that it just seemed best to combine them all into a soup. I assume any fleshy gourds that you have on hand could be used for this.
Ingredients:
Heart of Gold Squash
Buttercup Squash
Mini Pumpkins
Pumpkemon
Apprentice Pumpkin
Pie Pumpkin
~1lb of Carrots
1 Large Onion
4 Garlic Cloves
1 tablespoon Butter
Whole Milk
Low Sodium Chicken Stock
To Taste:
Salt Black Pepper Chili Powder Red Pepper Flakes Apple Cider Vinegar
Directions:
Preheat oven to 400°F (200°C) with a rack in the middle position
Clean gourds of seeds [saving seeds if you'd like] and pulp, and cut into ½-inch chunks
Add gourds to a large pot and cover with water, going about in inch past the top. Salt the water with a good amount of iodized salt.
Heat the pot until the water reaches 160°F (70°C) and turn off heat. Cover the pot with a lid and leave in the warmest spot in your kitchen for an hour [since the oven is preheating, one of the back burners, close to the oven's vent if where I keep the pot] [I don't know if this parboiling step was really necessary, didn't seem to be for this soup]
Line a sheet pan with foil and grease the foil with vegetable oil
After an hour, drain the water from the gourds. Add enough vegetable oil to coat, season with kosher salt and black pepper, and mix
Spread out the gourds onto the sheet pan in a single layer
Roast the gourds for 30 minutes. Flip/stir and then cook for another 20 minutes
As the gourds cook in the oven, peel and cut the carrots into ½-inch chunks
Dice the onion and mince the garlic
Melt the butter in a heavy bottom stock pot and add the carrots and onion, cook until softened
Add the garlic and the roasted gourds when they are out of the oven
Add stock till about and inch below the top of everything in the pot, then add milk enough to submerge everything
Simmer for 20-30 minutes
Blend everything with an immersion blender until smooth, careful of hot splatters
Season to taste with salt, black pepper, apple cider vinegar, chili powder, and red pepper flakes [you want some heat if you're going to use the leftovers for chili]
Simmer for another 15-25 minutes
Taste test when finished cooking and add any needed additional seasoning
Final Notes:
I liked having this mostly for what I did with the leftovers (but making this only for use in chili is too much work to do in one day). Maybe it would have been a better meal it it was paired with a sandwich or something. I think we ate it with bread.
I might have also seasoned with thyme based off the chili picture
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