A Deliciously Tasty Honeynut Squash Soup Recipe
Winter is a wonderful time for blended soups. These warm and hearty soups blend vegetables cooked until extremely soft and tender into a warm, hearty, and delightful broth. Garnished with croutons or crunchy pepitas and a swirl of cream either vegan or dairy, a blended squash soup is delicious, especially on the extremely cold days that can come at the height of winter.
If you’ve ever wondered how to get your butternut squash soup to a new level of intensity and flavor, the answer might be to switch squashes! Believe it or not, there’s a brand-new star in the squash family. Butternut squash’s child with buttercup squash, Honeynut squash is one of the best options for someone getting to know their gourds, with a flavor intensity that beats out either of its parent squashes and is more nutritious to boot.
Origins of Honeynut Squash
Honeynut squash, called honeynut pumpkin in Australia and New Zealand, is the latest star in the delicious winter squash family, joining its larger, milder sister butternut. Developed in the 1980s at Cornell, it finally entered the US produce markets in 2015 and has been picking up fans for its rich, sweet flesh that retains the lovely earthy characteristics of butternut squash, one of its hybrid parents. Because its flavor so strongly resembles a sweeter version of butternut squash, it’s been called “butternut squash’s mini-me.”
In addition to its denser, richer flavor, honeynut squash’s bright golden flesh flashes its powerhouse nutritional pedigree. Honeynut squash packs twice the eye-boosting beta-carotene and more vitamin A than the same amount of butternut squash! With oven roasting, you can enjoy the delights of honeynut squash with the added concentration of driving off some of the moisture in the squash and even caramelizing some of the sugars.
Our blended honeynut squash soup adds the earthiness and pungency of onion, shallot, and garlic and adds a bit of carrot for complexity while keeping the basic integrity of the squash flavor you’re looking for.
Ingredients:
- 2 standard-sized honeynut squash, seeds scooped
- 1 granny smith or another tart apple, peeled, cored, and sliced
- 4 tbsp olive oil
- 2 carrots, halved
- 2 stalks of celery, chopped finely
- 2 sprigs thyme
- 2 sprigs rosemary
- 2 sprigs flat-leaf parsley., chiffonaded.
- 1 medium onion, roughly chopped
- 1 shallot, roughly chopped
- 4 cloves garlic
- 1 carton chicken or vegetable stock
- Heavy cream or coconut cream for swirling
- Pepitas or toasted pumpkin seeds for garnish
Equipment:
- Sheet pan optionally lined with aluminum foil for easy cleanup
- Skillet
- Blender (immersion or jar)
Cooking Instructions:
Do NOT use a sweet apple for out-of-hand eating in this soup! An already-sweet squash with a sweet apple added to it will be sickly sweet. It needs the tartness of the Granny Smith apple to cut the sweetness.
Preheat your oven to 425 and line your sheet pan with aluminum foil. The aluminum foil is optional but highly encouraged because instead of sticking to the bottom of the pan, residue will stick to the foil, making cleanup easier.
Cut your squash into half, scooping out the guts with a spoon. The seeds of honeynut squash can be roasted like pepitas, making them crunchy and smoky, but you don’t have to. Prepare your carrots, onions, and celery. Get your garlic ready by smashing it with a knife and removing the torn skins, then place it in the pan with the squash.
Halve the shallots and put them on the sheet pan along with the halved squash, apple slices, and herbs. Drizzle them with half of the olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Put the pan in the oven and roast at 425 for 20-40 minutes.
Once the roasting hits the 20-minute mark, check the squash and apples periodically. When they are ready, they should be darker and look slightly wrinkled and dehydrated on top. The shallot should start to look cooked and slightly translucent. Once the squash gives slightly under the touch of a wooden spoon, the pan is ready to remove from the oven to cool.
While the squash is roasting, sweat the carrot, celery, and onion on the stovetop in butter or olive oil to make a mirepoix, seasoning to taste with salt and pepper.
Once it Cools….
Once the squash is cooled, scoop it from its shells and compost the shells and other veggie scraps. In batches add your veggies, apples, squash, and an equal amount of chicken or vegetable stock to the blender and blend until uniform. Repeat with subsequent batches. If you’re using a
Keep over low heat until ready to serve. Serve with a swirl of cream or coconut milk, some of the reserved olive oil, and pepitas for crunch. Optionally garnish with parsley.
FAQ
Is Honeynut Squash a GMO?
NO! Honeynut squash is a hybrid variant of butternut squash and buttercup squash. It was developed in the late 1980s. It is about half the size and much sweeter than butternut squash, giving it a richness unparalleled by even the richest examples of the parent species. A commercially viable variant of honeynut squash reached the market in 2015 and has been picking up popularity since then.
If you are a person who worries about genetically modified organisms, you can eat honeynut squash in confidence. It’s not a GMO.
How can I tell when my Honeynut Squash is ripe?
Ripe honeynut squash is golden in color and may have light green veins. It will feel heavy for its size. When you’re buying honeynut squash, be sure to look for smooth, tight golden skin.
What is Sweating?
Sweating is a related technique to sauteing. In a sweat, the heat is kept low, so that the vegetables soften without caramelizing. Sweating is a difficult technique for beginning cooks to master, so just keep at it. If you get too hot and it starts to sauté, just turn the heat down rather than risk burning.
Can I Peel Honeynut Squash Before Roasting?
You can if you want. It’s mostly a timewaster, though. Honeynut squash becomes as soft as butter once roasted and can be simply scooped out of its shell once it’s been roasted.
How Long Does Honeynut Squash Keep?
If you want to roast your honeynut squash in advance of making the soup, you can roast it up to three days in advance of use and keep it in the refrigerator. Besides soup, honeynut squash is also delicious in grain bowls and ravioli.
Fresh honeynut squash will keep in a cool, dark place for 1-2 months. Butternut squash has a much thicker skin, so it doesn’t keep as long as its ancestor.
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