I’ve never tried it and it seems I have been hearing more about it. SO I noticed they had some at the store last night so I chose a small/medium one and brought it home to try…
Uh, what do I do with it now though?
I’ve heard of making it into soup, and I’ve heard of cutting it into chunks and then grilling it. What would you recommend? How do you like the flavor? How should I be storing it. I always keep summer squash in the refrigerator.
The cafeteria here makes sweet potato\butternut squash soup. It is delicious.
Also, a friend came camping with us and brought some butternut squash. She cut into chunks, wrapped it in tin foil, and threw it into the fire. Why? I don’t know why. But it was delicious, too.
I cut into chunks, coat it with a bit of olive oil, sprinkle salt and roast it in the oven. Some times I toss it with balsamic vinegar. It makes a delicious soup as well, I’ll have to try and dig up a recipe for that.
Cut into chunks, coat in olive oil, roast in the oven until tender, then puree it in a blender, add cream and a bit of grated nutmeg. Reheat. Good stuff.
Oh yeah, peel it first.
Cut it in half lengthwise, scoop out the seeds, and put cut-side down on a baking sheet. Bake for an hour or so, then serve. Maybe put some butter on. That’s it.
This is the way I always have it, its delicious. The little indent after cutting it is perfect for tossing a chunk of butter in before baking. I also like mine with pepper and I eat the skin but that part’s not for everyone.
Here’s a very simple recipe which I LOVE.
Cube the squash into 1 inch cubes, more or less.
Toss with some olive oil and kosher slat.
Place in an oven-safe container and roast in the oven at 350 degrees for 45-60 min.
Top with sauteed onions and serve.
Simple, but REALLY good.
All sounds really good. Is it similar to other squashes in taste? I’ve heard some people say it’s sort of like a sweet potato.
I second all the roasting recommendations–and go for the roasting-in-the-skin approach if you want it to be easy, 'cause peeling butternut squash can be a bit of a pain. But here’s another idea: Peel and dice your squash (about 1/2-inch dice). Boil water to cook a pound of pasta. While the water heats, saute the squash in olive oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add a good bit of minced garlic and saute a while longer (about 8-10 minutes total saute time). Splash in a small amount of water (1/4-1/2 cup), grate in some nutmeg, crumble in some sage, add salt and pepper to taste, cover the pan and let the squash steam in there until it’s nice and tender, maybe 5 minutes or so (it should be of a consistency that it will leave a squash-y coating on the noodles when you toss them together). When the pasta is al dente, drain it, return it to the pot, add the squash and toss together. Add some chopped fresh parsley and fresh grated parmesan cheese, too, and pass more cheese at the table. Yummy!
I did see this on food network last weekend, and can attest to the results as being absolutely amazing.
peel, de-seed and cube into the aforementioned butternut squash into 1" cubes.
add any combination of carrots, potatoes, sweet potatoes, parsnips, beets, or turnips.
toss with vegetable oil, salt and pepper.
Roast for 1 hour at 425, turning every 15 minutes. I find a large flat metal pan with the veggies in a thin single layer works best.
An hour is an approximate guide, but go until the sweeter veggies have a good caramelization on them.
You can serve these as a side for a roast, a veggie main dish, and puree the leftovers the next day along with some chicken stock and nutmeg in soup.
Damn good soup.
dammit, I forgot onions. How could I forget onions?
Red, white, the more the better.
Don’t forget to roast the seeds. Just like pumpkin seeds. Wash off, dry, 15 minutes in the oven with a little salt.
Butternut squash, like all winter squash, store for months in a dry cool location. I grow my own and throw a little in whenever I make burritos or a mexican casserole or chili or …
If I only want to use half or less of the squash, I cut off the stem end and use that part. I store the bulb end in the fridge until another recipe comes along.
This isn’t fancy, but damn if it isn’t one of my favorite, and at this point, classical preps for butternut squash.
Simply cut the squash down the middle. Clean the seeds (wash and slow roast at 250 for a couple of hours on a cookie sheet, and toss with, roasted slivered almonds, salt, cayenne, and nutmeg, if so desired.) prick the the squash halves with a fork, dot with butter and sprinkle liberally with brown sugar. Microwave on High covered with Saran for 15-20 minutes or until cooked soft through. IMHO, better than a Yam.
You can also use pureed leftover cooked butternut to stuff ravioli or shell pasta.
My mom used to use it just like pumpkin for pies, cakes and breads. We raised winter squash on a truck farm and kept the unmarketable ones, so she learned to be creative with them.
I also second (third? fourth?) the oven roasting and soup ideas and will add that once you prep them like you would for roasting, they can go on the grill too.
A less expensive alternative to butternut squash is acorn. They are about half the price around here and have a similar flavor.
Bon apetit!
ETA: Baked, they are good with maple syrup and butter.
If you’re roasting then blending it for soup, don’t bother peeling it. The peel disintegrates completely, and you benefit from the extra fibre!
Mmm, good stuff. In Australia, we call them butternut pumpkins.
You can make pie with it of course. Easy to fool people that it’s pumpkin.
Once roasted, mash it with some taheen, garlic and parsley for ghanoush.
Nice little side dish:
1c mashed cooked squash
1 egg
3-4 TBLsp honey
1/2c cheese (mild meltable )
small dash of sour cream, yoghurt or milk + salt & pepper
Mix up ingredients, into a baking dish, covered, 350F for 45 minutes or so.
I grow many squash varieties including butternut. It doesn't keep as well as acorn, but in a cool dark dry place, will last easily six months, provided the fruit was sound when picked.First, if you need to peel it for your recipe, don’t monkey around with cutting it up and trying cut the peel off the chunks - I’ve seen that in several recipes (including the one below) that tell you to do this, and it’s really obnoxious to do. Just get a good quality peeler, and you can strip the peel right off. I recommend holding the squash with a kitchen towel, since the peeled areas get slippery.
Lynn Rosetto Casper has a great recipe in How to Eat Supper. Put a big sheet pan in the oven at high temp (450 maybe?), chop up the squash, some onion, and garlic, mix together with a tablespoon or two of brown sugar, some olive oil, salt, and pepper, and a sprinkling of red pepper flakes. Throw in whatever sturdy greens you have that are on death’s door - spinach, kale, chard, etc. Toss everything to coat, and dump on the hot pan. Roast until everything is caramelized and the greens are getting pretty crispy. Serve over pasta with some cheese on top.
My husband (while he likes it) finally told me I needed to stop making this so often because he was getting a little tired of having it at least once a week. For me, it’s like crack.
No, it is nothing like summer squash. It’s more like pumpkin, or somewhat like sweet potato.
Here’s a recipe that works really well with acorn squash. I’ve never tried it with butternut before but I imagine it would work the same.
Cut the squash in as close to half as you can lengthwise. Clean out the seedy center. Now put them into a large foil wrap and put that into a baking pan. In the newly formed crevices of squash, put orange juice. You can even cut a small channel down the length to increase the area OJ is in. Glaze honey around the perimeter and some into the OJ as well. Keep the wrap open. It’s just to hold all the OJ spillage close to the squash. Bake for approximately 40 minutes at 400. It’s nice and toasty and sweet.
I like to stir-fry with garlic, black bean sauce. I found this sauce/paste in the supermarket and it matches up with the squash perfectly, IMO. If you like salty, garlicy stuff.
Cut the squash into cubes, 1/4 - 1/2 inch.
Stir-fry with a little oil in the wok.
Splat in a spoonfull or more of the garlic, black bean paste and toss for a few seconds (heat still on) to spread. If the sauce doesn’t mix well you can add a little water to thin it out.
Done and done. Throw a little bok choy into the wok if you want a nice green contrast to the orange squash.