Fall Squash. What to do...

After I made my last batch of butternut squash soup, I got another butternut squash and an acorn squash in my next produce delivery.  Well, I had plenty of the Curried Butternut Squash Soup, so I didn't want to make that again.  I looked up some recipes for acorn squash soup as well as some soups that used both, but all seemed too sweet or had cinnamon or something in them.  I was looking for something a little more savory this time.  Since I didn't find anything I really liked, I decided to wing it and come up with something of my own.  The soup turned out better than I had expected and I immediately wrote down the recipe before I forgot what I did.  It's a savory soup with a slight hint of sweetness.  The only seasoning is salt and pepper.  Nothing else was really needed.  The squashes provide plenty of flavor of their own.  It's the perfect fall soup for a Sunday afternoon.  I plan on having it for dinner tonight with a delicious BLT.

Roasted Acorn and Butternut Squash Soup

1 acorn squash

1 butternut squash, peeled and cubed

3 tbsp butter

1 large sweet onion, diced

2 medium leeks

4 cups vegetable broth

1 ½ tsp salt

2 tbsp brown sugar

Ground pepper to taste

½ cup half and half (I used fat free)

Cut acorn squash in half and roast at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes.  Remove and discard seeds.  Spoon flesh into a bowl and set aside.  While acorn squash is roasting, melt butter in large pot.  Add diced onions and leeks.  Saute about 5 minutes on medium heat.  Add cubed butternut squash, salt, pepper, brown sugar, and vegetable broth.  Simmer on medium heat for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Once butternut squash is soft, add acorn squash to pot and stir together.  Using an immersion blender, blend until smooth.  Stir in half and half.  Serve with crusty bread or half of your favorite sandwich. 

Buffalo Chicken Chili and Beer Bread

I have always loved chili.  I don't think there is anything better on a cold winter night than a big, steaming bowl of delicious chili.  Unfortunately, chili isn't one of those foods one could call healthy. While not everything I make is on the light side, as I've mentioned before, I've learned to cook lighter when I can.  I substitute lighter, healthier ingredients, and most of the time I end up with a much healthier and equally delicious dish.  Chili is something that you can easily lighten up by using chicken or turkey instead of beef.  I've tried a few different chicken chilis: some white chili that doesn't have a tomato sauce base; and some traditional chilis that simply use chicken instead of beef in the recipe.  All were good, but not what I would call great.  The recipe I'm posting today is sort of a combo.  I pretty much googled a bunch of chicken chili recipes and developed a hybrid of what I found.  If you like chili and you like chicken wings then this is the chili for you.  This is the perfect dish to serve for Sunday football with some freshly baked beer bread.  Beer bread is quite possibly the easiest bread you could possibly make.  It's only three ingredients and is the perfect side for any chili.


Buffalo Chicken Chili

1 large onion
3 stalks celery
2 large carrots
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp butter
salt to taste
2 lbs ground chicken (you could use shredded instead if you prefer)
2 tbsp paprika
2 tbsp cumin
1 tbsp ground chipotle peppers (or to taste)
1/2 cup buffalo sauce
1 (28oz) can crushed tomatoes
1 (12 oz) can diced tomatoes
2 cans white beans (I used great northern beans, but you can use white kidney or cannellini beans)

In a large pot or dutch oven, brown ground chicken and add spices. Remove from pot. Dice the onion, celery and carrots.  In the same pot, heat olive oil and add veggies, sweating until all are tender.  Put the ground chicken back in and mix together. Add buffalo sauce, crushed tomatoes and diced tomatoes, mix thoroughly.  Cook on low in dutch oven for 2 - 3 hours or transfer to crockpot and cook on low. Serve with sour cream and crumbled blue cheese and a side of beer bread.

  Beer Bread

3 cups self rising flour
1/3 cup sugar
1 bottle beer (the lighter the beer, the less the bread will taste like beer...I use Yuengling Lager)

Mix all ingredients in large mixing bowl.  Spray loaf pan with cooking spray and transfer batter to pan.  Bake at 350 for about 50 minutes.  When bread is finished, remove from pan immediately and butter the top of the loaf.  Serve warm with butter.

Blue Bacon BBQ Chicken Burgers

My husband and I just couldn't decide what to have for dinner the other night, but we knew we had to use up the gazillion potatoes we had.  I had a plan for that.  Check out these Skinny Texas Cheese Fries from Skinnytaste.  So, we had a side dish, but no main course.  We were leaning toward burgers, but we've been watching the amount of fat and calories we've been eating.  So, we landed on chicken burgers.  I have a couple of recipes that I use for chicken burgers, but none of them went really well with the cheese fries we had planned.  So, I decided to wing it.  I'm so glad I did, but because I think I ended up with the best chicken burger I've ever made!  We had a mini disaster as were about to cook the burgers.  Our grill ran out of propane just as I was about to cook.  My husband had a back up, but for some reason it wouldn't connect without leaking.  So, the grill was out.  We unburied our grill pan.  I usually prefer the grill to a grill pan, but in this case, not being able to use the grill turned out to be a good thing.  The burgers turned out extremely juicy and delicious.

Blue Bacon BBQ Chicken Burgers

1 lb ground chicken
2 tbsp diced shallots
1 tbsp garlic
1 /4 cup blue cheese crumbles
3 tbsp BBQ sauce
1 tsp salt
4 slices bacon
More BBQ sauce to taste

In a mixing bowl, mix first six ingredients together thoroughly,  Form into four burgers.  Put on the grill (or grill pan) until cooked through.  Serve on hamburger roll of your choice with one piece of bacon and BBQ sauce to taste.

Bacon and Egg Cupcakes

I am not a huge breakfast fan, but my husband is.  For that reason, I'm always looking for new things to try out.  I rarely actually try them, in fact if we do ever make breakfast it's bacon, egg and cheese on an english muffin.  And sometimes if we have people over, we make pancakes or waffles.  Well, since Pinterest is my new best friend, I've been even more inclined to try new things.  I kept seeing little quiches in muffin pans or an egg surrounded by Canadian bacon.  Since I didn't have all the stuff to try those things, I decided to use the concept and experiment on my own.  I had a package of reduced fat crescent rolls and a TON of eggs thanks to my bi-weekly produce (and egg) delivery.  Fortunately, I also had bacon the freezer. These really were the only ingredients I needed to make these delicious egg cupcakes.  They would be perfect for company...a great way to make a bunch of eggs at once.   You could also experiment with other types of meat or cheese or even veggies.  

Bacon and Egg Cupcakes

1 tube crescent rolls (I used reduced fat, but it's not necessary)

8 slices bacon (I used thick cut)

8 eggs

Cooking spray

Spray a muffin/cupcake pan with cooking spray.  Remove crescent rolls from tube and unroll.   Do not split along perforation.  Using a pizza cutter, slice them into 8 squares.  You could use a knife, but the pizza cutter will save you time and keep the dough from bunching up.  Put a square in 8 of the muffin cups, making sure the bottom is covered and up the sides as much as possible.  It doesn't have to be perfect.  In the meantime, cook the bacon until about half way done (It's important that it's not fully cooked or it will burn in the baking process).  Put one piece of bacon in each muffin cup, making it into a ring.  The crescent roll and bacon will be sort of a cupcake liner for the egg.  Next drop one egg in each muffin cup.  Bake at 400 degrees for 15 - 20 minutes.  I put them in for about 18 minutes, but I think 16 would have been enough.  It depends on how you like your eggs cooked.  Remove cupcakes from pan and serve with fruit as a side.  The perfect, easy brunch!

Makes 8 servings.