Guest Post: Winter Squash Soup

After 9 months of blogging, and featuring tons of various guest posts, I have finally convinced my husband to write a post for Domestic Superhero!  When we moved into our new house in April, I decided one of my goals would bee to have the house in order enough to host Thanksgiving there.  It is our first house, and how great would it be to host our first Thanksgiving?!  As November grew closer, I was menu planning, and my husband said that he would love to make one dish for the occasion.  We looked through recipes together, and he ended up finding a Squash Soup that appealed to him.  Of course when I noticed the recipe was from Smitten Kitchen, I knew it would delicious.  It turned out great, and I am so happy he wrote this post for me…maybe I have a Mr. Domestic Superhero on my hands…..

I even made the soup again over this weekend (with some healthy modifications-see below), and it was really great!  You could easily serve this as an appetizer, side, or main dish.  It’s perfect cold weather food! Check it out below 🙂

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After a very successful  launch and relaunch of my wife’s blog, I am excited to finally be writing an entry…it’s been a long time coming!  Keeping with the theme of postponed blog entries, I am writing today regarding a soup that I made for our Thanksgiving meal, approximately one and half months ago.   Better late than never, though, and this soup turned out really, really good.  Considering that I am not much of a cook, it will probably turn out even better when you make it, so expect a mouthgasm when you have it.

The soup is a winter squash soup with gruyere croutons, and I found the recipe over at Smitten Kitchen.   It was a perfect complement for the Thanksgiving meal, and I was glad that I chose it over some other recipes I looked at.  The only difference I remember making is that we did not use chicken broth.  We used vegetable broth (vegetarians making 12 times less the carbon footprint than meat-eaters, what-what?!?) and it still came out great.

Although the first step is the hardest, it isn’t all that bad, and you have satisfaction of knowing that the rest of the work is downhill from there.  You have to peel, seed, and cut up the uncooked squash, and that part is hard.  Taking out the seeds is easy, but peeling the tough skin and then cutting up the hard squash can be a bit difficult.  As I mentioned, though, not too bad, and you won’t regret it.

Next, melt the butter in a large pot on medium heat and add the onions and garlic to give them a nice saute   Add the broth, all of the squash (which will be cubes at this stage), and herbs, and bring this to a boil.  After the soup is a-boilin’, lower the heat and cover it.  Simmer the soup until the squash is tender, which was about 20 minutes; you can go a little less or a little more, depending on how much or little tenderness you want on the squash.

The last part was the most fun.  Doing the puree in batches, pour some of the soup into a blender and puree it.  Pour it out into another container, and do it again.  Probably took 4 batches to in the blender to get finished with the whole pot.  I say it was fun just because of messing around with the blender, but also, if you have a little one at home, they will love helping you pour it in, out, and pressing the blender buttons.  After it has all been pureed, return it back to the pot to re-simmer.  Stir in the cream and season with salt and pepper as you like.

For the croutons, you need about 2 minutes and 24 seconds.  Just butter one side of the type of bread you want to use and put in on a baking sheet with the buttered side up.  Broil it until a little brown/golden and turn over.  Sprinkle the cheese, and if you like, some herbs and salt and pepper.  After sprinkling the cheese, broil until the cheese melts.

Pour the soup into the bowls, place the bread in the soup, and…ENJOY!

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Winter Squash Soup with Gruyere Croutons

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup butter ** 1/2 stick
• 1 large onion finely chopped
• 4 large garlic cloves chopped
• 3 14 1/2- ounce cans low-salt chicken broth or vegetable stock
• 4 cups 1-inch pieces peeled butternut squash * about 1 1/2 pounds
• 4 cups 1-inch pieces peeled acorn squash * about 1 1/2 pounds
• 1 1/4 teaspoons minced fresh thyme
• 1 1/4 teaspoons minced fresh sage
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/8 cup whipping cream **

Gruyere Croutons

• 2 tablespoons butter 1/4 stick
• 24 1/4- inch -thick baguette bread slices
• 1 cup grated Gruyere cheese
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh sage

Instructions

Soup

1. Melt butter in large pot over medium heat. Add onion and garlic and sauté until tender, about 10 minutes. Add broth, all squash and herbs; bring to boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer until squash is very tender, about 20 minutes.
2. Working in batches, puree soup in blender )or use an immersion blender in the pot). Return soup to same pot. Stir in cream and bring to simmer. Season with salt and pepper. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Chill. Rewarm over medium heat before serving.)

Croutons

1. Preheat broiler. Butter 1 side of each bread slice. Arrange bread, buttered side up, on baking sheet. Broil until golden, about 1 minute. Turn over. Sprinkle cheese, then thyme and sage over. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Broil until cheese melts, about 1 minute. Ladle soup into bowls. Top each with croutons and serve.

Recipe Notes

**I made this recipe a second time, and tried to lighten it up a bit. It was great the first time, however I thought I could make it more waistline friendly. I used only 1 TBS of butter, and 1/8 cup non fat plain Greek yogurt in place of the heavy cream.
Without the croutons, the recipe came out to about 125 calories, 1.2g of fat, 28g carb, and 3.2g protein (per 2 cup serving). I would definitely call this healthy!

Like healthy soups? Check out all my skinny soup recipes:

Skinny Lasagna Soup	Skinny Cheesy Enchilada Soup	Hot & Sour Soup	Skinny Creamy Cauliflower Soup
Fire-Roasted Tomato and Red Pepper Soup with Grilled Cheese Croutons	Winter Squash Soup	Skinny Cheesy Vegetable Chowder	Skinny French Onion Soup

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– Allyson