I love soup pretty much all the time.
Perhaps it is because it is always cold here,
but I really do like to think it is because it
just makes me feel warm and satisfied.
My friend brought this soup over to my house one day...
and I LOVED it.
I have since modified it and
you can too based on what is already in your kitchen.
And I will apologize in advance for the photos in this post.
I had no idea they were so bad...but the soup is G-O-N-E!
Ingredients
1 Butternut Squash
1 Red Pepper
1-2 Pears
1 Red Onion
1-2 Cups of Vegetable Stock
Olive oil (1-2 T)
2-3 Cloves garlic (or even more)
Sea Salt and Ground Pepper to taste
EDIT: 1 can of stewed tomatoes or 3-4 tomatoes sliced and oven roasted
NOTE 1: If you do not like too much red pepper taste, try adding only 1/2 the pepper. NOTE 2: The pear adds sweetness, so you may want to play with that quantity as well.
NOTE 3: You can also add a leek.
EDIT - NOTE 4: Roasted tomatoes or a can of stewed tomatoes also compliment the flavors nicely, but are not necessary
COOK IT!
- Preheat oven to 400F.
- Cut squash in half and place it in a 9 x 13 glass dish filled with about 1"of water.
- Place in oven and bake for approximately 1 hour. A fork should easily go into the squash when it is done. If not done, check back every 10 minutes or so for doneness.
- Cut pear (and peel it), cut red pepper and onion into medium size pieces. EDUT and tomatoes into slices
- Crush 2-3 cloves of garlic.
- Place pear, pepper, onion, tomatoes (stewed tomatoes need not be roasted, but can be throw in here too) and garlic into another 9 x 13 glass dish. Drizzle with olive oil; sprinkle with salt and ground black pepper (to your liking).
- Place in oven and cook for approximately 30 minutes. Check for tenderness, add time in increments of 10 minutes until done to your liking.
- Once squash and veggie/fruit mixture is finished, let cool a bit.
- Remove seed from the squash.
- Scoop out the meat of the squash and place in a food processor.
- Process squash, adding vegetable stock (1/2 cup at a time) and/or water to make the squash smoother.
- Begin adding the veggie/fruit mixture and more veggie stock until the smoothness is desired. NOTE: Add stewed (canned) tomatoes during this step as well.I like a thicker, chunkier soup, so I used about 1 cup of stock. Using more stock just makes is smoother/thinner.
Guess what...?
You are done and ready to enjoy!
I like my soup as is with a crusty piece of sourdough bread.
You can add goat cheese, feta cheese or sour cream...
or whatever you want!
How do you like your soup?