bacony butternut squash!
July 10, 2011 § 1 Comment
Well, here’s a thing – today’s goings on in the golden kitchen are also inspired by that episode of Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall’s ‘River Cottage Everyday’ that was on telly the other night. I say ‘inspired by’, because as I watched it I thought ‘oh yum’ but forgot the details of it all about half an hour later… I usually make soup with roast butternut, and I have stuffed them before, but something about Hugh’s addition of bacon and nuts to the stuffing triggered something in me. Something deep, deep down within me that said ‘MUST. EAT. THIS. SOOOOOOON.” I had a squash in the fridge that I was planning to roast and soupify anyway, so armed with what I could remember of Hugh’s recipe I set off.
And in my personal history of eating things stuffed with other things, I think this was the most delicious stuffed thing I’ve ever eaten. Really, I’m not just saying that. It was amaaaaazing….
The first thing I did was roast the squash. So I cut it in half and removed the seeds…
…then scored the flesh. I’ve found this kind of speeds up the cooking time, AND makes it much easier to scoop out the flesh. So with a sharp knife I scored down across, but was careful not to go too deep – you don’t want to pierce the skin on the other side…
I seasoned with salt and freshly ground black pepper, slathered a wee bit of olive oil over them, and into a hot oven for about half an hour. While that was getting all hot bothered, I fried off a few rashers of smoked bacon. I chopped them up quite roughly before I fried them so they wouldn’t get lost in the stuffing. And in the last few minutes I threw in a chopped clove of garlic for a bit of extra oomph. Here’s the bacon all nice and crispy…
And here’s the squash out of the oven! See how the slicing into the flesh has made it kind of expand? That’s perfect. There’s also a wee gash where I tested it with a knife to make sure it was nice and tender [I wasn't stabbing the thing just for the sake of it. That would be both cruel and unnecessary].
So leaving about a centimeter around the edges and on the bottom so that the shell holds its shape, I scooped out the flesh into a bowl and mashed it up a bit with the back of the spoon…
…added the bacon and garlic, a wee handful of mild cheddar [not mature - with the bacon mature cheddar would make the whole thing a bit too salty] and a wee handful of nuts. I think Hugh may have used walnuts but I didn’t have any so used hazelnuts that I toasted in a dry pan and chopped up…
I gave it a wee mix, then added about a teaspoon of dried thyme, and a handful of breadcrumbs. I always have a container of breadcrumbs in the freezer that I add to whenever there’s a heel of bread left over. It only takes a minute or two to whizz it in a food processor and then you always have a ready supply. This batch was made with some leftover olive and rosemary bread which gave the whole thing a nice herby undertone.
So that’s the stuffing done – time to stuff something with it! Here’s the skins of the squash filled and ready for their second spell in the oven, with an extra sprinkling of cheesy-nutty-breadcrumbs for meltyness and a pinch of dried parsley for aesthetics…
…and about 15 minutes later, when all the cheese is bubbly and melty and golden and the breadcrumbs and nuts are all nice and crispy, it’s done! I served them with a simple pile of dressed leaves. The flavour of the squash is so rich though, it needs a zingy kick so I used an oil/balsamic dressing with a lot of balsamic. Onto plates, dig in, and as I said at the start – this was….
…amaaaazing!
Looks tasty!