Butternut Squash Soup

I have been unable to update the blog during the past couple of months. However, it was for a very good reason. I participated in my first Art fair where I presented jewelry designed and created by me. So, I spent most of my nights and weekends working on these jewelry  pieces. It was a great experience and it felt good that so many people appreciated my work. I have also been working on my first video post, but that still needs a bit of work, before I can publish it. So, that is something else that I am looking forward to. With those updates I will go onto the recipe.

This is a wonderful, velvety soup. Butternut squash is a kind of pumpkin that can be found in the grocery stores almost through the year. I use it to make a pasta sauce, as well as, stir fry it. It also makes a great side dish. It makes the most delicious soup. The sweet taste of the squash is balanced using the onions. This is a great winter soup and since it is a thick soup, it can also be a light meal. 

Ingredients

1 butternut squash

1 small red onion or 2 shallots, diced

1 tbsp butter or oil

2-3 cups of water/vegetable broth

salt to taste

Method

The butternut squash has a very tough exterior skin and it is difficult to slice it through or to peel it. So be careful when you are handling the squash. Cut the squash along the length of the squash. Remove the strands and the seeds at the center of the squash. Apply a little oil to the squash (inside and out) and then bake the two pieces, cut side down, in the oven at 350 F. Alternately, make a few more pieces and pressure cook the squash. It takes about 30-40 mins for the squash to get cooked and softened in the oven and about 15 mins in the pressure cooker. Then, take the squash out and once it cools, scoop out the squash with a spoon. Discard the skin/peel. 

In a saucepan, heat the butter and add the diced onions. Once the onion is cooked and softened, add the scooped out squash. Cook the butternut squash for a couple of minutes and then add the water or broth. Add salt. Let it boil for a minute and then puree the mixture, till you get a fine velvety consistency.  This is a thick soup and it will taste watered down if it is made too thin. Garnish with some cream and pumpkin seeds. Serve hot.

Tips

The easiest way to remove the strands and seed is to use a spoon with sharp edges and scoop it out. If the soup is watery, boil it for a few mins. You can also dissolve a little cornflour in water and then add the paste into the soup to thicken it if it is too thin. If it is too thick, then add some additional water.

Stir Fried Sphagetti Squash/ Sphagetti Squash Upma

This is a recipe that I made up trying to think of different ways to use sphagetti squash. Now, this squash is called sphagetti squash because when it is cooked, the squash can be separated into sphagetti type strands. It is a great substitute for sphagetti and tastes great with marinara sauce (see recipe).   I had a lot of cooked sphagetti squash left over and was wondering what other recipes could I use it in. I was inspired by "vermicelli upma" which is vermicelli noodles with Indian seasoning and decided to try something similar with the sphagetti squash. The result was awesome. I also tried serving it as a vegetable side with rotis and it tasted great.

Ingredients
1 sphagetti squash, cooked and separated into strands
1 onion, diced (optional)
1 tbsp oil
1/8 tsp mustard seeds
1/8 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp urad dal
5-6 curry leaves
a pinch of asafoetida/hing
1/4 tsp turmeric
2 tbsp peanuts (optional)
salt to taste

Method
Heat the oil and add the mustard and cumin seeds. As the mustard seed crackles, add the hing, urad dal and let the urad dal turn a light brown. Then add the curry leaves. Next add the peanuts and stir fry for a minute. Then add the onions if you are using them. Cook the onions till transparent and lightly browned. Then add the turmeric, mix and then add the sphagetti squash. Mix thoroughly so that the squash is covered with the seasoning and salt. Though the squash is cooked, let it cook with the seasoning so that it gets a nice flavor. You can even let a little of the squash touching the base of the pan brown. It gives it a nice caramelized flavor. Serve hot. You can serve it as a side with chapati/roti. It also tastes great on its own as a main dish and can be eaten as a snack as well.

Tips
The baked method of cooking the sphagetti squash makes for nice dry squash, however it is a lenghty method. An alternate way is to pressure cook it.  Add a little water to your pressure cooker (enough so that the cooker will function properly), then put the halved, cleaned squash skin side down so that the skin is in the water and the rest of it is above it.  Then pressure cook it. In this method, the squash may get a bit watery, however it is fast and if you are going to cook it further in an open pan (like in the recipe above), then the squash will dry out as it cooks.
You can skip the onions and just add the squash directly into the seasoning. This preparation also tastes great.

Sphagetti Squash

This is the healthiest "pasta" you can possibly have. I had noticed it stacked next to the butternut squash, on my visits to the grocery store but hadn't tried it.  This is the first time I cooked this squash and I absolutely loved it. Once the squash is completely cooked, it forms ribbons or sphagetti like strands. Hence, it gets the name "sphagetti squash".

This makes for a wonderful, low calorie option for pasta. You can pair it with marinara sauce and it is a delicious alternate to regular sphagetti with marinara. This is also a really great substitute if you are looking for a low carbohydrate option and is gluten-free.

Ingredients
1 sphagetti squash
1 tbsp olive oil (optional)
salt to taste

Method
Preheat the oven to 350F. Cut the sphagetti squash into half along the length. Remove the seeds. At this stage you can apply a little oil over the exposed cut side of the squash. I didn't add any oil and it still cooked perfectly. Bake this for about 20-30 minutes, till the skin softens up a little. At this stage the squash is completely cooked. Use a fork and separate out the strands of the cooked squash. At this stage it is ready to eat.  You can sprinkle a little salt and pepper and it tastes great just by itself.

Tips
Top it with marinara sauce or any pasta sauce that you would usually pair with sphagetti pasta.

Dudhi Chutney - Squash/Gourd Chutney

My last post was a dudhi related recipe, and this one is a dudhi recipe too. However, the two are so different that one can never guess that both dishes are made using the same main ingredient. This chutney is a wonderful accompaniment to any main course. The most fun part is that this is made using the peel of the dudhi which is generally discarded. I have heard that the vegetable skin holds a lot of nutrition, but the reason you would want to make it is that it tastes delicious. The first time I tasted it, I thought it was a coconut chutney and was very surprised to learn that the main secret ingredient was dudhi. The requirement for this recipe is a relatively blemish free dudhi which has a nice light green covering. Wash the gourd really well and dry it and then grate the outer peel, just enough to remove the peel from the gourd (we don't need the remaining part of the gourd, just the peel akin to zesting a citrus fruit). You can use the rest of the gourd to make dudhi halwa or a dudhi vegetable.

Ingredients
1 gourd peel grated (see instructions above)
1/8 tsp mustard seeds
1/8 tsp jeera/cumin seeds
pinch of hing/asafoetida
5-6 curry leaves
2 green chillies chopped
1 tbsp sesame seeds
2 tbsp grated desssicated coconut
1 tsbp oil
1/2 tsp sugar
salt to taste

Method
Heat the oil. To it add the mustard and cumin seeds. Once these seeds begin to crackle, add the hing, curry leaves, sesame seeds. Fry this for a minute, then add the grated dudhi peel. Cook this till the dudhi peel turns from a green to a brown color. Then as the lauki peels are starting to brown, add the shredded coconut and cook till lightly browned. Add salt and the sugar. The chutney is ready to be served!

Tips
See the post for dudhi halwa recipe to find the different names by which dudhi is called. It takes a while for the dudhi to turn to a brown color. However, it is only at the stage when it turns brown that it crips up and will have a crunchy texture. If you remove it from heat when it is still green, it will be soggy. To avoid standing near the stove for the entire duration, turn the heat to a low setting and then keep checking on it from time to time and stir it to ensure that it doesnt burn.

Dudhi/Doodhi Halwa - Squash Pudding

This is one of my favorite desserts and the best preparation was what Mom made. Dudhi is known as lauki or ghiya and in the Asian store here, I have seen it referred to as "ozbo squash". As a child I learnt that its called bottle gourd in English. It is basically a type of squash which has a light green color skin. It has a sweet taste when raw. It is not a vegetable eaten raw normally, so how do I know?! Well, my dog used to gulp it up raw. He used to relish it. That made me curious and so I tasted it and it was surprisingly good, like a sweet cucumber. My mom usually used to make a dudhi subji usually and the halwa preparation was rare occurence, which made it even tastier.

Ingredients
1 dudhi, peeled and grated
1/4-1/2 cup ghee/clarified butter
1 cups whole milk
1-3 tbsps ricotta cheese or mava/khoya (optional)
1/8 tsp cardamom
1/8 cup raisins - soak this in a little water
1/8 cup sliced, blanched almonds
3/4- 1 cup sugar (to taste)

Method

Heat a large pan and add the ghee and the grated dudhi to it. Stir, cover and cook this till the dudhi is cooked and softened. You will know its cooked when it turns transclucent. Also, as the dudhi is cooked down, it will release a lot of water and will also shrink to a smaller volume. Keep stirring occasionally so that the dudhi does not stick to the bottom. Once the dudhi is cooked, add the ricotta cheese and cook this till the ricotta cheese dries up a little. I didn't have ricotta cheese so I didn't add it in. Next, add the milk to the and cook this mixture till the liquid evaporates and the mixture is drier. At this stage, add the sugar and cook till the mixture is cooked to a halwa consistency. Add the cardamom powder, the raisins and the almonds.

Tips
The key to making great dudhi halwa is to cook it, till it caramelizes a little. The ricotta cheese is used to provide the "mava/khoya" taste and texture.