Butternut Squash and Red Lentil Soup

Cold Saturday mornings are perfect for making soup. They're relaxed and my husband is home to help me look after our 7 month old daughter, Abigail. There's been a large butternut squash sitting on my counter for over a week and I've been wanting to turn it into a soup since I bought it. I also recently bought red lentils for the first time to make into baby food. Turns out I really like the taste of them - they're kind of nutty and spicy. As soon as I tasted them, I knew they'd be a great addition to a soup. As I thought about making butternut squash soup, I was convinced the lentils would add a nice rich taste. Turns out, I'm not the first one to think of this. Surprise! Ha ha. The web is full of recipes for butternut squash and red lentil soup. I looked at a few of them, but none really appealed to me, so I decided to make my own recipe. Here are the ingredients I used and what I did with them:

Ingredients

1 large butternut squash

1/4 cup butter

1 medium white onion

1 small leek (I would've used 2 if I'd had another)

2 celery stalks

4 large garlic cloves

2 large carrots

1/2 head of cauliflower

6 cups of chicken stock

3/4 cups of dried red lentils

several stalks of fresh thyme (you can use dried)

1/4 cup of chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley (you can use dried)

1 tsp of dried rosemary (I would have used fresh if I'd had it)

1/2 teaspoon of dried chopped bay leaf (again, I would have used fresh)

sea salt and pepper to taste

paprika, nutmeg, cumin and coriander to taste

Method

I prefer the taste of roasted squash so I started by halving the squash and scooping out the seeds, then laying it cut side down in a baking dish with about an inch of water. I put it in a 400° F oven for about 45 minutes until the squash was soft.

While the squash was baking, I melted the butter in a large stock pot and chopped up the onion, leek, and celery. I didn't worry about chopping anything too small as I planned to puree the whole mix after it was cooked. I also peeled 4 large cloves of garlic and crushed them by pressing them between the flat side of my knife and the cutting board. I added all of this to the butter and sautéed it for about 5 minutes, until the vegetables were soft. While they were sautéing, I chopped up two carrots, two celery stalks, and half a head of cauliflower. I added these to the pot and then added about 6 cups of chicken stock. I just added water to powdered stock mix but you can use boxed or homemade stock as well. And if you want to keep this soup vegetarian, you can use vegetable stock instead. Next I rinsed the lentils and added them to the pot as well. I brought everything up to a boil and then turned down the heat to medium low, added some salt and pepper, and let it simmer for about 45 minutes, with a lid partially on. When the squash was finished, about halfway through the simmering time, I took it out of the oven, peeled it (the skin comes off fairly easily once it's cooked), chopped it up, and added it to the pot for the remainder of the simmering time.

Once everything was soft and the flavours had had a chance to blend together, I turned off the heat and let it cool a bit. I fished out the thyme stalks as they're a bit woody, and then I scooped portions into the blender and pureed it until I had a nice smooth consistency. I had to add a bit of water to each blender-full to help loosen it up and make sure everything pureed evenly. Once it was all pureed, I put it back in the pot and did some tasting and seasoning. I added some more pepper, as well as paprika, nutmeg, cumin, and coriander to taste (I used about 1 tsp of nutmeg and about 1/2 tsp each of paprika, cumin, and coriander).

I served it with a dollop of sour cream and a sprinkling of chopped fresh parsley. Delicious!!