If you like the crisp edges of lasagne, the soaked croutons, the whipped cream that gets icy around the chocolate scoop - you’re in the right place.
Hello everyone! I hope you had fabulous Thanksgivings. I was reluctant to emerge from my 4-day gravy-flavored lock-in, but with all the decorating this week, I’m ready to march on to Christmas.
I’m sharing a squash soup here that resolves all the things that usually make squash soup relentlessly sweet and dull. This one has texture (thanks to mashing rather than puréeing), and a range of flavor (thanks to a slow-cooked base of celery, sage and tomato).
Most squash soups play up sweetness by having you roast the squash and include onions. This one skips both. Honeynut, the sweetest of squashes, needs no such assistance. We focus instead, on developing a wider range of flavor to ground the sweet squash, which can be reckless on its own.
Take your time to sweat, caramelize, infuse and intensify before you add the squash and simmer in water. Don’t do that smart thing called mise en place. Getting the squash ready while the celery, sage and tomato find their umami will hold you back from adding it too soon.
A Savory Base
HONEYNUT, SAGE & CHICKPEA SOUP
Serves 4
This soup is textured and deep, grounded by a savory base of celery and sage, and finished with chickpeas. With plenty of savory notes to pin it down, sweetness becomes a charm.
Focus on developing the savory side. Sweat and caramelize the celery, go long on sage, and brown the passata to encourage the toasty notes that will give the Honeynut its charisma.
1 head celery
1 pinch chili flakes
1/2 cup packed sage
4 medium-large Honeynut squash (Kabocha is my second choice)
4 tbsp olive oil, plus more for drizzling
1 cup passata
1 can chickpeas, rinsed
Slice each celery rib in half lengthwise, then dice into half inch pieces. Place the chopped celery in a wide-bottomed pot or Dutch oven with the olive oil and three teaspoons of salt, and cook over low heat with the lid on, stirring occasionally, for around 10 minutes.
While the celery sweats, peel and deseed the squash. Make sure you pull out all the stringy bits with the seeds, as they taste raw even when they’re cooked. Dice into one-inch pieces.
When the celery is soft, remove the lid and stir as you drive off water and encourage caramelization, around 5 minutes. When the celery is sweet, add the sage and chili flakes. Cook for another two minutes or so to infuse the sage and chili into the oil, then add the passata and turn the heat up high. Reduce the passata to a tight paste, stirring often, until it resembles what you’d squeeze from a tube, about ten minutes.
When the base tastes savory and intense and begins to catch on the edges of your pan, add the diced squash and enough water to cover it by an inch, about six cups. Simmer until the squash is squashable with the back of a spoon, about 15-20 minutes. Then add the rinsed chickpeas and continue to simmer for another 5 minutes. Turn off the heat and, using the back of a spoon or a potato masher, squash some of the chickpeas and squash to make a sludge that brings the chunky soup together.
Taste for seasoning, add more salt if you’d like to, and eat with more olive oil drizzled on top.
REINVENT LEFTOVERS
Toss the soup through orecchiette or rigatoni, shave ricotta salata on top.
Temper some chili and cumin in oil and swirl it into the soup, serve over basmati rice with a spoon of yogurt.
Topped with toasted filberts and 🚨🚨🚨