Roasted Squash Soup
This velvety soup is perfect for Meatless Monday, for a night with the gals, or served to the male members of your life with pancetta bits sprinkled on top. Careful not to slice your hand when you are quartering your squash. I use a large, very sharp knife and cut through the squash using a see-saw motion.
1 acorn squash
1 butternut squash
1 tablespoon olive oil
Salt and pepper
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, peeled and diced
1 carrot, peeled and diced
1 stalk celery, diced
2 quarts chicken broth (or vegetable broth)
1/2 cup white wine (optional)
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon dried sage or 1 tablespoon fresh chopped sage
Salt and pepper, to taste
1/2 cup half-and-half
Optional: 1/3 lb. diced pancetta + 1 teaspoon olive oil
Preheat your oven to 425 degrees.
Carefully slice your squash into quarters. Scoop out the seeds and gooey strings.
Brush meaty parts with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Place on a roasting pan, cut side up, and roast for 45-60 minutes or until squash is easily pricked with a fork.
Set aside to cool a bit. Remove flesh from skin, once cool enough to handle. Discard the skin.
While squash is roasting, prepare your other vegetables. In a large soup pot, sauté your onion, carrot and celery in 2 tbsp olive oil over medium heat until the veggies begin to soften about 8-10 minutes.
Add in your squash, broth, wine, allspice, sage, salt and pepper. Whisk to combine. Bring to a boil. Then reduce heat and let simmer for 20 minutes.
While soup is simmering, brown your pancetta in a teaspoon of olive oil for about 5-6 minutes. Drain on a paper towel and set aside.
When simmering is finished, remove soup from heat. Using an immersion blender (my preferred method) or a blender, puree soup until smooth.
Whisk in your half-and-half.
Scoop the velvety concoction into shallow soup bowls. Top with sprinkles of pancetta and a sage leaf for added loveliness. Enjoy.
YIELD: One big pot full
Carrie, I am making this tonight!
Thank you for the recipe, and the lovely photos.
Hope you enjoy it, Kristy!!
I’m making it, but I think we’ll have the same male/female split in this house, and there’s only one of me. Well, at least I’ll have a yummy dinner! 🙂
Ahhhhhhhh! Your squash soup was wonderful, and the little extra touch of the bean soup mixed really hit the spot. Loved it, simply loved it. You have surely equaled your mother’s and grandmothers’ in your cooking skills.
Thanks, Dad…. xo
Don’t forget you do have the “Dude.”
I LOVED your squash soup and even had 2 bowls of it. I think the guys are really missing out. In my opinion, it was far better than the bean soup.
Thanks, Mom…. Love you. xo
Your Dad’s makes me laugh!
I do have a simple butternut squash soup I have been making for a while that everyone eats at my house, but it is considered an appetizer … they need ‘real’ food for dinner. Here it is …
1. Peel your butternut squash, cut down the middle and scrap out the seeds. Then chop into ~ 1/2 pieces (some stores carry butter squash already done to this point)
2. Brown squash with some olive oil until golden brown on several sides … this gives the soup a sweeter-yummier flavor
3. Add water until squash is covered and powdered chicken stock OR liquid chicken stock and no water.
4. Let cook in gentle boil until squash can be easily crushed with wooden spoon (about 10 mins), then turn heat off and blend with a hand-held blender inside the pot until it’s all smooth! If it’s too thick add water. Top with parmesan cheese.
This is simple and quick and can be cooking on the back-burner while your ‘real’ food is cooking.
Can’t wait to try your squash soup!
Maria, maybe that’s the problem…. I’ve been trying to pass the squash dish/soup off as the main course. Maybe I need to simply have it as an app. Thanks for your recipe. Can’t wait to try it, my friend!
Carrie,
I really enjoy your blog & recipes.
My husband must be an outlier when it comes to squash soup. He LOVES it. We experiment with soups all winter, and this is always a must make at some point during the cold weather. I too, love Kari’s Kitchen, and I recall a wonderful Smoked Salmon Chowder we made in her kitchen – it also was a big hit with my husband. (our boys and soup? Not so much!) Thank you for sharing!
Robin, can your husband come over and give my boys and hubby a talkin’ to? Thanks so much for stopping by La Pomme!
It took me years to get my husband to willingly eat…and enjoy…. soup for dinner. Thinking back, many of those early soups were squash or potato based and usually thick, creamy, and perfect for bread dunking (imho). He would eat it of course, but let me know something else would have been preferred. Lately he has been enjoying soup more and I believe the difference is the consistency and base. I’ve been tending towards bone broth based simple soups with either some egg stirred in or a maybe a handful of greens. He likes these much better and they are decidedly less “girly”. With respect to the squash, he will happily eat it roasted with other vegetables in a quinoa salad and loves it in homemade butternut squash ravioli with a brown butter sage sauce.
Rebecca, I love your idea of the butternut squash ravioli. I may try that next. Clearly, I need to move in a different direction from the thick squash type soups. Thanks for the inspiration!
How funny – I love that your dad mixed the two soups together! In our household, squash soup is welcomed with open arms by male and female family members alike. In fact, my father-in-law is an admitted “fool for butternut squash soup”.
Dara, I clearly need to come on over to your site and try your squash soup recipes. Maybe it’s not the squash’s fault but it’s more of an “operator error” issue. Speaking of your soups, I just remembered how I wanted to try your chicken and butternut squash stew. That’s going on my meal plan for this week!!