Another success!

Today, I ventured into the world of butternut squash.   One of the things about eating locally, is that you have to be willing to try new foods.  The great thing about this is that you get to expand your eating repetoire and never, ever get bored of eating the same old thing.  Winter squash are the vegetable of choice right now, and especially into the coming winter months.  They keep so easily, you can buy some now and they'll still be good in a month.  A lot of people love spaghetti squash and acorn squash, so you can try those too.  All squash are basically the same, cut them open and roast them until they're soft.  So our goal for today is to try a winter squash variety that is new to you.

So today, I tried butternut squash, once again from Farmer Tom.  FYI - Most grocery stores have a local section, and butternut squash is guaranteed to be there.  I peeled it, removed the seeds and cubed it yesterday while dinner was cooking and stored it in the fridge.  Today, I put it on a pan with some diced onion, 4 chicken thighs (with skin and bone), olive oil, and salt and pepper.  I roasted all that for about 30 minutes at 400.  Then, I put the chicken aside to cool and dumped the rest in with 4 cups of chicken broth in a soup pot.  You only have to cook it for about 10 minutes on medium high, and then mash a bit of it so that it's not so chunky (you can puree it if you really want).  Cut up the chicken after removing the skin and bones and add it to cook for the last few minutes.  Add a couple of teaspoons of lemon juice before serving. 

Now, we all know that my hubby is the real test of this recipe.  When he saw it all cut up before roasting, he said "Yum, cheese!" and was about to pick it up to eat it.  I told him, no that's not cheese, it's butternut squash.  Well, that didn't scare him too badly.  In fact, by the time we ate it (I stored it in the fridge, as we were having it for dinner six hours later), he had forgotten about the "squash" word entirely.  As he was eating it, he hollers from the couch, "Hey, this is pretty good!"  I said, "Really?  You like it?"  He said, "Yes.  Just don't tell me what's in it.  Okay?"  I said slyly, "Oh, it's just chicken and cheese."  To which he said laughing, "Yum, I love cheese and chicken."  And he ate every last little bite, or I guess spoon full.  So try it out!