So, I’m not a recipe blogger but I do like to cook and most of what I make is pretty good. I’m going to break the form and not go into a protracted explanation of what the inspiration for this recipe was. I would recommend using a wok with a cover and an immersion blender. If you don’t have those, use whatever pots or blender/food processor you have at your disposal.
Prep time: 30-45 mins. Cook time: 1+ hours.
Shopping List:
1 x 3-4 pound butternut squash
1 bag of kale. I don’t know, 10-12 ounces. Whatever size they sell.
1 x Medium Sized Onion. I use sweet ones. They work best with this recipe. If you want to use a couple of shallots instead, those would probably work too.
1 quart of vegetable broth or chicken broth (I’m vegetarian but I’m not going to judge).
Salt – More than you think you’ll need
4-5 cloves of garlic. Or use more. You really can’t overdo it
Rosemary
Sage
Olive Oil – Enough for a drizzle and to cook an onion
1 – 8 ounce package of seitan. Or, if you eat meat, use bacon and cook it to a nice crisp
Instructions:
- Preheat oven to 375, unless you have an oven with a thermometer that actually works correctly, then do 400. If you aren’t in the US, your inferior oven might not go up this high. You are probably going to want to do 200.
- Peel the outer skin of the squash and chop off the stem. Cut it in half lengthwise. Don’t cut yourself(This is important).
- Line a baking sheet with foil and place the squash halves on it. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle your 3 year old rosemary from the back of the spice cabinet on top of it. Put the squash in the oven and set the timer for 45 minutes.
- Go watch some YouTube or read a book for a while.
- Pull the squash out of the oven and run a knife through it to make sure it’s soft. (Use oven mitts)
- Wash last night’s leftover dinner from your wok and put it on medium/low. Throw the entire bag of kale into it with a splash of water and cook it down a bit (Until everything is wilted). Realize that you probably should have used some of the broth and throw about a cup of that in there too.
- While the kale is cooking down, cube up the squash and throw it into a separate pot with the rest of the vegetable broth. Use your immersion blender to blend until smooth. If you don’t have an immersion blender pour everything out of this pot into a standing blender and say, “Curse you A.B.. This is information that would have been helpful to have before I dirtied another pot!” Anyway, blend until smooth.
- Decide the mixture is a little too thick and add a half cup of water. Blend some more.
- Poor the entire mixture over the now wilted kale and stir together.
- Add a liberal amount of salt to the whole thing and stir a bit more. Now would be the time to cover.
- It is at this point you will realize that you’ve done nothing with the onion and that you forgot to buy a head of garlic.
- Chop up that onion and throw it into the pot you used your immersion blender in or uncurse my name and use the one you thought you had dirtied for no reason when you used a standing blender instead. Use some olive oil here (1-2 tablespoons). If you didn’t forget the garlic, now would be the time to put in a liberal amount of crushed garlic.
- Cook the onion until it is translucent and mushy soft.
- Add a quarter cup of water to the onion and run it through your blender of choice until smoothish. Throw this new mixture into the wok and stir. Take a minute to think to yourself about how much easier this whole onion thing would have been had you just cooked it before cutting up the squash.
- If you’re using bacon, you probably should have cooked it a little earlier but it’s not too late. Anyway, chop up the seitan or cooked bacon and add it to the conwoktion.
- If you forgot the garlic, go into your spice cabinet and retrieve the garlic powder or garlic salt. Add a bunch to the wok. You’re really going to have to go with your gut on this one.
- Add some more rosemary to the dish and look around your spice cabinet or rack for the sage you knew you had. It’s going to take a little bit of time to realize that you don’t have any sage. Say, “To hell with this,” and grab the thyme instead. You have a lot of that. Here’s another prime, ‘go with your gut,’ moment. You can overdo this one, so be careful.
- Drop the heat to low and simmer, covered, for about an hour. Test the taste and add a bunch more salt. You should be good to go now.
- Somewhere between leaving it to simmer and dinner time you are going to realize that you used seitan in the recipe and that your significant other is gluten intolerant. Don’t worry though. Unless they have an actual food allergy, they will be able to pick around it or just deal with the consequences.
Makes 4-10 servings. I don’t know how much you or your family/friends/enemies eat.