By: Chef Laura Bonicelli
Hearty Butternut Squash Soup is a simple recipe that is all about the flavor of the squash and its beautiful, intense color. Buy your ingredients at your favorite Farmers Market!Â
About Hearty Butternut Squash Soup
Hearty Butternut Squash Soup is a favorite use of one of my favorite squash. The smooth non-stringy flesh purees beautifully. The color is intense and bright. It’s hearty enough to be a meal in itself, but it also makes a stunning starter or accompaniment to a sandwich. My Roasted Vegetable Sandwich is perfect with this soup. If you’re looking for a salad to go with the Butternut Squash Soup, try my Roasted Beet and Orange Salad. The color of the oranges is perfect with the squash.
putting it together
The good news about this Hearty Butternut Squash Soup recipe is you don’t have to peel the squash. You do have to cut it into quarters and scrape out the insides. The flavor base starts with butter, a little onion, and the squash’s seeds and scrapings. To that, you add chicken stock; vegetable stock works too. From there, you add the squash quarters in, cover the pot, and let the squash steam until it’s completely soft. I use my pasta pot with a lift-out colander for this. It doesn’t matter if the squash is partially in the liquid.
Once the squash is cool enough to handle, scoop out the flesh and add it to your strained stock. Now at this point, an immersion blender is a God-send because you can puree the soup right in the pot. But, if you don’t have one, a blender works too. Just be careful while you’re transferring; the soup’s hot! By the way, you can skip the cream if you like. The nutmeg is a nice touch, but I usually omit it if I plan to finish the Hearty Butternut Squash Soup with a flavored finishing oil.Â
My Hearty Butternut Squash Soup is a substantial and filling Fall and Winter soup. The soup freezes beautifully, so you can always have some on-hand for a cozy cold-weather meal.
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I hope you love this recipe!Â
Step by Step Instructions
Butternut Squash Soup
Equipment
- pasta pot with removable colander
Ingredients
- 8 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1/3 cup minced yellow onion
- 5 pounds butternut squash -- unpeeled and quartered seed and strings scraped out and reserved
- 6 cups chicken stock -- preferably homemade
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- 1 1/2 teaspoons Kosher salt
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- 1/2 Cup heavy cream
- 5 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg -- optional
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- crËme fraÓche
- herb flavored olive oil
Instructions
- Heat the butter in a large Dutch oven over medium heat. Add onion and cook, frequently stirring until translucent, about 3 minutes. Do not brown. Add squash scrapings and seeds and cook, occasionally stirring until soft and uniform in color, about 4 minutes.
- Add the stock to Dutch oven and bring to boil over high heat. Reduce heat to medium-low, place squash cut side down in steamer basket and lower into pot. I use my pasta pot with its colander for this. Cover the pot and steam for at least 30 to 40 minutes until tender. Pull the basket out of the pot and remove the squash to cool. When cool enough to handle, use a large spoon to scrape the squash from the skin into a medium bowl and discard. Pour reserved stock (steaming liquid) through a strainer into a second clean pot.
- Pull squash flesh from skins and put it into the pot with the cooking stock. Add the salt. With an immersion blender, puree squash and reserved liquid until smooth.
- Stir in cream, brown sugar, and nutmeg (if using.) Heat over medium heat until hot. Add additional seasoning, if necessary.
- Garnish the soup with a dollop of crËme fraÓche or a drizzle of flavored olive oil.
Nutrition
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Simple to make and I loved the nutmeg! Thanks for the option of scaling too.