9 Squash Recipes to Make the Most of This Year’s Harvest

[Music] hello this is chef john from foodwishes.com with loaded butternut squash cordon bleu that's right there are so many amazing things people do with butternut squash they roast it they make soup they well actually that's pretty much it which is why i'm so excited to show you this and by the way i'm burying the lead here this video is actually serving as a test for a new studio i'm going to be filming in so if everything looks different it is and i was not working with my full setup but despite that this came out incredibly well and to get started let's talk about how to choose the right butternut squash for this recipe and that would be one where the bottom in the top part or neck are about the same size okay the bottom is always going to be a little more bulbous but if you can try to find one like this where that is not so pronounced and then once we have our squash the next thing we want to do is cut it in half lengthwise without losing a finger and for that we will start our cut going through the top ideally cutting through that really hard stem right through the center and at no point during this operation should your other hand come anywhere near that blade and then once that's been accomplished we'll use that as a guide to cut all the way to the back of the squash although definitely not in one big grand cut okay we want to go slow and just do a little bit at a time which i do with a combination of a rocking motion on the knife as well as for the thicker parts giving it a little pound with the other hand on top but again at no point is our guide hand anywhere close to being able to go under the blade and eventually especially if your first cut was nicely centered you should be able to split this in two very uniformly and that's it we now have two halves and at least ten fingers and then once we have that split we'll go ahead and take a spoon and scrape out the seeds and one of the main reasons i want you to buy squash that's not overly curvaceous is because you're going to have less seeds and more squash okay so please remember that old rhyme if the butternut squash has a large ass you're going to want to take a pass but anyway we'll go ahead and scrape out those seeds as shown and then so these sit nice and flat i think we should slice off about an eighth of an inch from the bottom all right not too much just a little bit so they lay nice and flat and that is going to be it for our prep we'll go ahead and transfer those onto a foil lined baking sheet at which point we can transfer that into the center of a 375 degree oven for about an hour and a half or so depending on the size or until they are beautifully tender but not falling apart and of course we're going to test that with a tip of a knife and you can see here some old scars from previous testing and then as soon as those are cool enough to handle what we'll do is scoop that cook squash into a bowl but very important we do want to leave about a half inch attached to the skin so i'll actually use the boundary of the cavity at the bottom as a guide and then we'll go around scooping getting most of it but like i said we do want to leave some attached so this doesn't fall apart since of course we're going to use these as shells to stuff everything back into and if we end up scooping all the way down to the skin these might sort of collapse when we cook them and they just won't look as nice and then to our scoop squash we will add some salt as well as some freshly ground black pepper plus a nice big spoon of dijon mustard which is absolutely critical here okay we really do need that to balance the sweetness and the richness and that's it we're going to finish this step up with one beaten egg at which point we'll take a nice big spoon and give this a mix but also a mash or eat if you want okay if you want to leave this nice and chunky that's your business i mean you guys are after all the lords of your loaded gourds but personally i do like to smash mine fairly smooth and then what we'll do once that's been all stirred and smashed together is toss in some sliced green onions followed by because we're calling this cordon blue some diced smoked ham and a lot of it as well as some gruyere cheese which is the classic cheese used in cordon bleu but i think a nice sharp white cheddar would also work out beautifully here and that's it we'll simply give this a mix until everything is combined and as you might have noticed i actually diced the cheese instead of grating it since i think texturally those bigger pieces are going to work better in this okay i think if the cheese is grated it sometimes emulsifies right into the squash instead of having hundreds of little pockets of cheese here and there and also i forgot to bring the cheese grater to the chute and that's it as soon as that's mixed we'll go ahead and fill our shells as evenly as possible which is a classic example of a super obvious instruction that nobody ever needs but always gets okay raise your hand if you were going to put a lot more in one than the other see i didn't need to tell you that but what i do need to tell you is that once those halves are stuffed we'll go ahead and top this with a little more cheese and i'm actually going to use a potato peeler here to make nice long thin slices which i think is going to look a little nicer than if we used a grater which of course coincidentally i don't have and just to bother some people i did one haphazardly and then did the second one in a much more orderly fashion probably to prove that once they come out of the oven they're going to look the same and that's it once those have been cheesed rando and crosshatch were ready to transfer into the center of a 475 degree oven for about 15 minutes or so or until they're beautifully browned and look like there's a green onion on the table man that's annoying anyway where was i oh yeah or until they look like this and i know it is not normal to get so excited over a squash recipe but i really was since this looked and smelled so amazing and then i went ahead and transferred those onto a cutting board for service partly because i didn't have a big platter with me but also because we're going to slice these into sections when we serve them anyway and that's it i went ahead and finished up with some sliced green onions and then i relocated to our new quartz countertop since i thought it would look nicer for the pictures since as i mentioned this was a test for getting a feel for the new studio and we'll do a full reveal at the appropriate time but here's a little sneak peek at the range island okay that's enough but anyway i grabbed a knife and sliced in and loved everything i was feeling and seeing and i couldn't wait to grab a fork and dig in and that my friends with some incredibly hammy cheesy butternut squashy goodness okay extremely flavorful as well as fairly rich and decadent but not overly so and a lot of that comes from the gruyere cheese which is very buttery and nutty and that's why it works so well with this squash and of course smoked ham is never not great with these ingredients so i don't really feel like i even need to mention that and i'm not doing a very good job of showing it but the still attached squash does come off really easily from the skin okay i was just worried about hitting the tripod it's not really that hard so yes this was quite lovely right off the cutting board but i did go ahead and plate up another portion next to a salad which i think for something like this is a very necessary pairing right not only do we get a temperature and texture contrast but an acidic dressing will help cut through the richness we spoke about earlier and i know you're probably thinking that all sounds great but please for the love of god can you eat that piece of diced ham off the top it's been sitting up there way too long don't worry i got you and while i'm definitely presenting this as a main course i think this could also work very nicely as a holiday side dish although i would probably switch out the ham for some caramelized mushrooms which i'm thinking would be very very nice but whether you make this meatless or not or you serve it as an entree or a side either way i really do hope you give this a try soon so please follow the links below for the ingredient amounts a printable written recipe and much more info as usual and as always enjoy [Music] fried stuffed squash blossoms this was one of the most delicious things i've eaten in a long time and i really hope you have access to squash blossoms wherever you happen to live of course if you have a garden and you planted zucchini you will have an abundance of squash blossoms so there they are gorgeous beautiful squash blossoms i believe these are from zucchini but i can't confirm that all right so step one here we're gonna blanch the squash blossoms in some boiling salted water so bring some water to a boil on the stove you're also gonna wanna have a bowl of very cold water to throw the squash blossoms in as soon as they come out of the boiling water so when the water is boiling throw your squash blossoms in and we're only going to do this for about 30 seconds or so maybe 45. all right so this is kind of almost real time although i did a little bit of editing so basically we're just wilting them very slightly so that we're able to stuff them so as soon as they look like that which again is only going to be about a half a minute plunge those into your ice water or very very cold water and when they're completely chilled remove to paper towels to drain so while our squash blossoms are draining we're going to go ahead and make our stuffing which is basically a goat cheese filling so i have room temperature goat cheese nice and soft i'm going to add an egg yolk and then a little bit of grated sharper style cheese now i'm using a sheep's milk cheese called arti gazna i believe it's how it's pronounced but you could use anything like a gruyere or a cheddar or even a manchego alright i'm also going to give it a little bit of black pepper and some cayenne and i'm going to stir that until completely smooth and that is our filling transfer that into a heavy duty plastic bag we're gonna do the old trick where you snip off the end there and make like a little piping bag right you seen us do that before right okay so once the filling is done and in the bag we are going to stuff our now drained squash blossoms so at the bottom at the base here we're going to have a little bit of an opening a little bit of a cavity you can kind of see down in there so that's where most of the stuffing is going to go so you want to put your piping bag or your plastic bag with the cut off tip all the way to the bottom pipe in about a tablespoon and then use the petals which are now very soft and easy to work with we're going to drape the petals over any exposed cheese filling and it doesn't look like it when you first start but there's going to be enough to cover beautifully see that and just fold any excess back all right one more time stick your piping bag or in our case our plastic bag with a cut off tip all the way to the base squeeze in about a tablespoon into the opening and then carefully fold those delicate petals over any openings until covered and you're always going to have a couple extra petals which you're just gonna wanna fold back over like that so really not that hard all right those are gonna go in the fridge until we're ready we want those very firm when we dip them in the batter all right so those go in the fridge speaking of batter could not be easier cornstarch self-rising flour and water and by the way let this be a lesson to you do not be stubborn in the kitchen that bowl was too small i realized it as soon as i added the flour so i switched to a bigger bowl all right to the cornstarch and self-rising flour we're gonna add some ice cold water now i'll give you measurements on the site of course but the water there's not really a measurement i just add a little bit at a time until we have a mixture that's basically the same consistency as a pancake batter all right you can see it right there next i'm going to put about an inch of vegetable oil in a heavy duty pan i'm using cast iron here and i'm going to get it nice and hot if you're going by temperature about 350 you can test it with a little piece of batter all right so that's ready i'm going to take out my squash blossoms i'm going to dust them lightly with flour on all sides that's going to help the batter stick all right and after they're dusted i'm gonna dip them into my batter you can again see that consistency you want it just like that let it drip off and quickly carefully place them in your hot oil i'm just doing three here because i gotta film it and work at the same time but you could probably do six in this pan easily and these are only gonna take a couple minutes so on the first side i went about a minute i flipped it and because of the way the batter flattens out a little bit you're basically going to get three sides not two so i flipped it once i went another minute i flipped it onto that third side and went about i don't know maybe half a minute they really do cook quickly i'm going to remove those to a paper towel to drain of course we're going to let these cool for a few minutes so you don't burn your guests and are those gorgeous or what so beautiful so once those have cooled a little bit we're going to transfer those to a plate and then oh man it's time to dig in and it's really almost impossible to describe how amazing these are all right i know fried stuffed flowers can you believe it but just amazing that tangy goat cheese all right that little bit of extra sharp cheese we have in there the egg yolk kind of tightens it up a little bit but not too much adds a little richness and that batter so simple so light crisp but not oily just really really beautiful so anyway like i said i really hope you can find some squash blossoms near you this is such a treat and by the way when people are like hey what are we having you could say cheese stuffed reproductive organs which is you know always a great conversation starter so anyway i really hope you give this a try all the ingredients are on food wishes.com as usual and as always enjoy roasted butternut squash soup that's right even if you don't have a calendar you can tell when it's turning fall the leaves change colors there's a little chill in there and twitter fills up with pictures and links to butternut squash soup recipes and it was seen a couple of those that reminded me i've never posted my version for this quintessential autumn soup so let's go ahead and get started with prepping what i call the world's most dangerous gourd and that's because the butternut squash is so big and so hard it's basically a severe cut waiting to happen so i'm going to show you what i think is the safest way to split this which is by cutting off the top here and then what we'll do is we'll take a large sharp knife and cut directly into the center of the neck just like this and please note my other hand is not getting anywhere close to this blade and is it going to matter that i didn't cut that exactly in half because i was paying more attention to the camera than i was to the squash no it won't be a problem at all and then once we split that through the center like that what we'll do is we'll tip it up like this and simply cut it straight down to split and for me not only is that the easiest way it's definitely the safest because at no time should any of your fingers be in the way so we'll split our squash in half and then we'll grab a spoon and scrape out the seeds and of course yes we could save those seeds and roast them but we're probably not going to do that hey we're busy making soup but if you want to go for it you are the lords of your gourds so feel free and then once our butternut squash has been split and scooped we can move on to prepping our roasting pan where we're not only going to roast our squash but we will also roast the other vegetables going in the soup so let's go ahead and drizzle a little olive oil into the bottom of the pan and then we'll dump in our onions and carrots and we'll give that a nice big pinch of salt and give that a little toss in the oil and i'm also going to toss in about six whole peeled garlic cloves all right don't slice them don't smash them too much just toss those in whole and then we'll place our butternut squash in cut side up and i'm also going to give that a little sprinkling of salt and then we're going to roast all of that in a 400 degree oven for about an hour or until our squash is soft enough to scoop so mine took about an hour but that's really going to depend on the size of your butternuts and how you're going to tell us how we usually tell we'll give it the old poka poka with a knife and as you can see those have been previously poked and then what we'll do is we'll let that stuff cool down a little bit and while we're waiting we're going to go ahead and make what is basically the secret ingredient to this recipe a sage infused brown butter so what we'll do is we'll melt about four tablespoons of butter over medium heat and you've probably seen this before first it melts then it foams up and then it starts to slowly but surely take on a little bit of a golden color and at this point it's not a bad idea to turn your heat down just a hair so we don't go too far because what we're trying to do is catch it at that perfect moment when it goes from golden to sort of a light nutty brown which is what we have right here and at that point we're gonna quickly do two things we're going to turn off the heat and throw in a handful of sage leaves and even though the heat's off there's going to be enough heat in that butter to toast those leaves and infuse that butter with its gorgeous gorgeous flavor so we'll stir in our sage leaves and we'll simply leave that on the back of the stove until it's ready to add to the soup which is going to be pretty soon because once your veggies are roasted this is a very fast soup to put together so we'll go back over to our squash which have cooled down a little by now and what we'll do is we'll scoop out that flesh and yes we did get a lot of beautiful caramelization on those onions and carrots which is not only going to add flavor but it's also going to help give us a beautiful color not only do we want this soup to taste roasted we want it to look roasted and then like i said we'll scoop out our squash into that pan and please don't worry if you get a little piece of skin here or there we're definitely going to strain this soup so no big deal so we'll go ahead and we'll scoop out our nice soft squash at which point we are now officially ready to make the soup so we'll head over to the stove and transfer everything into a soup kettle and once that's been accomplished we'll go ahead and add our brown sage butter and then for a little touch of extra sweetness we'll do about a tablespoon or two of either honey or maple syrup and both will work beautifully here but personally i go with the maple syrup and the reason is simple i like canadians better than i like bees and then we'll go ahead and add our chicken broth and yes of course you can go with water or vegetable stock if you're one of them they're vegetarians there's nothing wrong with that hey if everybody ate meat it would be more expensive so to me selfishly they do serve a valuable purpose and we'll give that a stir and we'll turn our heat up to high and bring this up to a simmer and then what we'll do as soon as our soup starts bubbling is we'll turn our heat down to low and simmer this for about 45 minutes to an hour and even though everything's cooked and there really is no great scientific reason to cook it that long i do it anyway and i think it comes out better so i would love to explain why but i can't and after about one hour this is what mine look like and at this point we're ready for final production so the first step to that is we're going to blend this very very smoothly and of course you can do that in batches in a blender but i find these stick or immersion blenders much much faster and easier so i'm going to blend mine for a few minutes until it's very smooth at which point i'm going to highly suggest we pass this through a strainer okay the blades of a blender or food processor are really never going to break down all that material as small as those incredibly tiny holes in our strainer so by passing that through even though it's going to look pretty much the same you're going to get something that on the pallet feels much smoother much silkier so we'll go ahead and strain our soup and we should be left with only the most fibrous bits and then once our soup is strained we're on to the adjustment phase first up adjusting the thickness so i'm going to check this out with my ladle and it is very very close but i do want it just a hair thinner i mean we do want it thick and hearty but we don't want pie filling so if you need to add a little bit of water that's just you cooking and then the second adjustment will be to balance the sweetness with the following ingredients we're going to put a nice big splash of apple cider vinegar as well as a couple nice big pinches of salt and of course we'll bless this with a little shake of cayenne and as soon as we stir that in and the soup heats through we're done of course we're going to take a spoon and taste it because you may still need to adjust a little more salt so i gave mine a taste and it was perfect so i went ahead and ladled that up into a hot bowl and i'm going to garnish it very simply with a nice spoon of creme fraiche which you know you can make yourself right we have a video for that and i'm going to finish off with some chopped chives and that my friends may be the best autumn soup of all time just an absolutely gorgeous color and what i'm pretty sure you'll think is an incredibly deep rich satisfying flavor i mean butternut squash already have a beautiful earthy subtle sweetness that we've just accentuated a little bit with that maple syrup and the way those sweet flavors kind of play against that little bit of vinegar and that little bit of tanginess from the creme fraiche is just absolutely delicious but anyway that's it roasted butternut squash soup i was just about to say wait for the next cold rainy day and whip up a pot but you know what this stuff is so good no matter what your current atmosphere or conditions are i really do hope you give this a try soon so head over to foodwishes.com for all the ingredient amounts and more info as usual and as always enjoy [Music] spicy lamb sausage and rice stuffed acorn squash such a beautiful way to use these gorgeous gourds and while it takes a while to bake it is a very very fast and easy recipe to make the hardest thing may be cutting these acorn squash in half because they're really really hard so you're going to want to make sure you got a nice sharp knife you're going to keep your hands and fingers completely away from that blade i like to start it by sort of rocking it back and forth until it's definitely going down the center all right that little stem end there that's the hardest part so be careful there try to go down the middle as evenly as possible and just keep your fingers out of the way and you should be fine i might give it a tap or two to help it along all right once i have it cut in half i want to see how it sits if it's not sitting on a flat spot i'll take the knife and just give it a little trim just to take off that rounded edge so it sits a little more securely next step of course we're going to take a spoon or a melon baller and just scrape out all those seeds and fibers and those are prepped i'm going to toss those into a casserole dish i lightly oiled the bottom and then it's on to our stuffing which features this margay's sausage a spicy lamb sausage very very highly spiced you can use any spicy sausage for this i'm gonna take it out of the casing so just cut it with a knife i'm using scissors here and that meat will pull right out all right so i have about a half pound i'm going to crumble it up in a bowl i'm going to add some salt some freshly ground black pepper some cumin some cinnamon i'm also going to add some finely diced red bell peppers and a lot of fresh mint all right so mint and lamb definitely go well together so that really works here i'm also going to crack in one large egg and what may be a little bit of a surprise some yogurt or buttermilk either will work i'm using buttermilk here all right just a little bit all right i want you to take a spoon and i want you to mix that really really well i want you to break that meat down into a paste until it looks like that at that point i'm gonna add a cup of cooked rice now i know you see a little bit of steam there don't be alarmed mine was still a little warm which is okay but colder room temperature also works alright so i'm gonna dump the rice in we're gonna mix that thoroughly and when it's all combined we're going to go ahead and fill our four acorn squash halves all right and you want to pack it down pretty good and you want to go around to make sure you've divided it evenly which i have right there all right to finish this off i'm going to go ahead and sprinkle a little bit of bread crumb over the top i'm also going to put a light dusting of parmesan cheese and just maybe a half a teaspoon of olive oil per just drizzle it over so just a little bit of a crust on there sort of protects it and it will make it look very very pretty later all right now we're gonna put this in a 350 degree oven covered but very loosely covered i want you to take a piece of foil and just basically tent it over the top it should not be touching the squash all right i'm gonna bake that for one hour at 350 and it's gonna look like that so i'm gonna test with a skewer here the acorn squash should just be starting to get tender just barely starting to soften i'm going to leave it uncovered put it back in same temperature and bake it for another half hour to 45 minutes until two things happen the top looks beautiful and golden brown and the squash is very very soft and tender then you are ready to taste something incredibly delicious and yes of course you knew it was coming let it cool a little bit so you can actually taste it you're going to be tempted to dig right in but trust me a 15 minute wait will be well rewarded with an awesome bite of food look at that such a glorious combination that sweet earthy squash the spicy sausage the comforting rice those slightly exotic seasonings just a beautiful thing acorn squash you know they're good for you but they're almost too good for you so let's make them a little less good by adding some spicy sausage yet still have a healthy and delicious dinner lunch side dish you name it so i really hope you give it a try head over to foodwishes.com for all the ingredient amounts as usual and as always enjoy delicata squash that's right i'm going to show you how to prep and cook what i think is the world's most exciting winter squash and i know there's not a lot of competition but this really is a great product and very much underused and i think that's because it sort of looks and feels like one of those decorative gourds that your mom would put on the mantel around the holidays but while it is very attractive the real beauty lies within is we're about to reveal so with that let's go ahead and get started in the beginning we need to do two things split this in half lengthwise and not cut off a finger okay because these things are very hard we have to be very very careful so what we want to do first is slice off both ends okay that stem part that was attached to the plant is extremely hard and if we don't remove that this is a lot harder to cut and then we'll spin it around and cut off the end where the flower was attached and then what we'll do once those ends are trimmed off is sort of roll it around and try to find a spot that's maybe a little flatter than the other spots and there might not be one but whatever position you think is the most stable and then what we'll look for is a seam that's right in the middle and we'll start to cut in but just barely because once that gets started we want to take our other hand and use that to kind of pound the knife into the squash and once there's no knife left to pound we will switch to a rocking motion and we'll simply rock it back and forth applying a little bit of pressure until we finish that cut and by using this method there is very little chance you're going to cut yourself all right maybe a few you will still manage but since there's really no fingers coming close to that blade this really is a pretty safe method and then what we'll do once that's been split open is take a spoon and scrape out the seeds in any of those fibrous bits and if this was another channel i tell you you could save those seeds and roast them and then eat them but i've never actually done that so i don't really feel right telling you to but anyway we'll go ahead and remove those seeds as shown at which point we will flip these over to the flat side and then proceed to slices into nice evenly sized pieces all right i think a quarter inch is too small and a half inch is too big so i'm going to shoot for about 3 8 but as usual you're going to decide you are after all the peter tosh of your delicata squash although when you do pick a size you want to stick with it so these all cook at the same rate and please notice i'm using what i call the sushi cut which is where we find the mark with the front of our knife and then slice through with a very smooth elegant forward motion all right one smooth slice should do it oh and as you should have noticed by now we didn't remove the skin okay one of the great features about the delicata squash is that the skin is very very thin and once cooked up is not only edible but extremely pleasurable so anyway we'll go ahead and slice those up and if you have to clean up a few of those end pieces with a spoon go ahead and once those are set we'll use our bench scraper to transfer those into a bowl where we're going to season those with some olive oil salt and cayenne and you would have seen me do that if my battery hadn't run out but good news i didn't actually put enough in so i changed my battery and added some more and to recap that was olive oil salt and cayenne pepper to taste and once that's seasoned up any which way you want we'll go ahead and give that a toss to make sure that's all evenly coated and you could just use your hand or spatula but of course if you're cool and people are watching you'll want to give it a flip or two and once our squash are seasoned and well lubricated we'll transfer those onto a sheet pan and i'm using one of these textured non-stick ones but a pan line with parchment or silpat would also work perfectly and we'll go ahead and spread those out because of course we just want a single layer just a single layer just a single layer just a single layer by the way i've heard beyonce's a huge fan of the show well not so much herd but i assume so we will transfer those to the pan and space them out as evenly as we can at which point these are ready to roast so let's go ahead and transfer those into the center of a 450 degree oven for about 12 to 18 minutes depends on the size or until the bottoms are browned and they're nice and tender so i let these go for about 12 minutes and i pulled them out to take a look and i gave them a little test with a toothpick and they were tender and the bottoms were browned but i wanted them to go a little farther right these were close but i wanted a little more caramelization so i decided to pop mine back in for about five minutes and yes you can flip them if you want but i don't i'm not against it i love flipping things pancakes houses scripts but i actually prefer the texture and appearance if one side is really brown and the other side isn't but suit yourself if you want to add a step go ahead and flip them but like i said i went ahead and put those back in for five minutes at which point i determined they were perfectly done and at this point they are ready to serve hot warm or room temp which is how i like them best so i let these cool down all the way because while they do make a fantastic side dish serve warm my favorite use for these is served at room temp with a dip as a snack so i transfer those to a dish with that beautiful brown side up and served it with the world's first pumpkin spice aioli actually it was just curry spice but since this fall we're gonna brand that seasonally and call it a pumpkin spice aioli mostly to annoy people on twitter and that my friends is an amazing seasonal possibly holiday snack so let me go ahead and grab one of these and give it a dip and possibly a double dip and that really is an incredible treat right that flesh is sweet and starchy and tender and sort of creamy plus we have that very thin sort of snappy skin that i wouldn't really call crispy but i wouldn't call it not crispy it's just a really interesting combination of textures and if you're repulsed by the thought of a pumpkin spice aioli which you probably should be which as i said was just a curry spice this would be good with so many other dips okay a lemon aioli would be great or any kind of yogurt base sauce you will figure out something but anyway that's it my favorite use for delicata squash i always see piles of these at the store this time of year but i never see anyone buying them so hopefully this video might help with that because you'll make a batch and everyone at your party will be like hey what is this and how do you make it so for those reasons and more i really do hope you give these a try soon so head over to foodwishes.com for all the ingredient amounts and more info as usual and as always enjoy zucchini and ricotta casserole that's right it might not look like much but this was so incredibly delicious and right about this time of year you are welcoming any kind of zucchini recipe that makes you forget you're eating zucchini and this one does so check it out all right first step here we're going to cut up our zucchini but in a very specific and quite exciting way so we're going to top and talum and then we're going to cut it lengthwise in half just like that and then we're going to cut them in chunks but we're going to use like 45 degree angle cuts like that angle it one way angle it the other and that way and back that way so basically we're cutting them in large triangles why because people love pointy food it's a proven fact so if you have to rewind that a couple times and watch it over you'll catch what i'm doing and i'll you know get a few extra views doesn't hurt all right once your zucchini is cut throw it in a mixing bowl we're going to toss in a good amount of crushed garlic a nice glug of olive oil some salt of course bland vegetables are the devil's playground so you got to salt your vegetables generously i'm also going to give it a little pinch of smoked paprika because that's going to taste good in this and then last and maybe most importantly a giant pinch of freshly sliced mint leaves that's right i did a chiffonade we've done that before do i need to do that demo again all right so i rolled up some fresh mint leaves sliced them up threw that in that herb is amazing with zucchini all right where did you try this all right we're going to take a spatula we're going to mix that thoroughly and then we're going to transfer it into any kind of baking dish i'm using this round one but you can use any kind of casserole dish and since the amounts in this recipe are not so important chop all your zucchini and then figure out which baking dish you have fits it that's even a better system and then we're going to take a spoon and place dollops of regular ricotta all over the top and basically what you're looking for as far as a ratio you want the spaces between the dollops to be as big as the dollops themselves so we're not going for total coverage we do want some spaces in between but we are going to be fairly generous so i use like a cup and once the recoat is down we're going to go ahead and sprinkle it with cayenne i think it looks really cool when it bakes and of course you know i have a little bit of a fetish so i'm going to sprinkle that on and that is ready for a preheated very hot oven that's going to bake in a 450 degree oven for 30 minutes and why i want it so hot i want the edges those pointy edges of zucchini and that rakota to really caramelize if you cook this at a low temperature for a long time the juices would leak out of the zucchini and it would just kind of stew and steam instead of roast so you see here the edges are kind of browned the cheese is kind of caramelized and yet it's not all soupy and like i said it might not be the most attractive zucchini side dish ever but when you dig that fork in and you taste that soft tender sweet zucchini with that baked ricotta cheese you get that little spicy smoky hint from the paprika and the cayenne underneath you have the garlic and the fresh mint just brightening it up it's just really a great combination of taste and textures and that plain ricotta when you bake it like this gets sweeter and kind of dry and it is a great contrast with that roasted zucchini and like i said earlier this time of year people are generally pretty sick of zucchini especially if you have a garden that's right you planted too much didn't you so this really is great if you have s z f severe zucchini fatigue it's a common condition and this will cure it so i really hope you give this a try head over to foodwishes.com for all the ingredient amounts and more info as usual and as always enjoy [Music] butternut squash and mascarpone cheese gnocchi or is it mascarpone i don't know it was al capone not el capone anyway however you pronounce it this was so unbelievably delicious and here's how i did it it was pretty easy i took a butternut squash i'm only going to use about half of it i want a pound in this recipe so i trimmed off the top cut it in half split that down the middle once that was split i put it on a plate covered it in plastic wrap and microwaved it on high until tender now i know we don't do a lot of microwaving around here but it works great for this you could roast it if you want but this is just a lot faster and easier so that's how i did it you can do it any way you want so that took me about eight minutes i unwrapped it i let it cool on paper towels and when it's cool enough to handle peel off the skin it should peel right off if not use a knife so there we go i got about two cups all together and i'm gonna set that aside until needed all right for the rest of the mixture so easy some mascarpone cheese very very rich italian cream cheese we're also gonna add a couple large eggs some salt some black pepper and some parmesan cheese okay finely grated parmesan and once that's grated in there i'm gonna give this a mix and right here i realized why am i trying to mix this with a spatula so i switched to a whisk which is going to do a faster and better job and you want to whisk that together until it's all smooth and it looks like that all right and then we're going to throw in which by now is just barely warm butternut squash i'm gonna whisk that in i'm gonna mash it i'm not gonna puree this in a blender which some recipes will have you do i actually want those little tiny particles of squash intact i think it's a little harder to work with but i think it's much better for the final product all right and then the final ingredient here which i'm going to stir in in a couple additions is just regular all-purpose flour not much i'm only going to put in about a cup unlike most traditional gnaki recipes this is not a dense chewy kind of firm yaki this is a very soft light tender dumpling so we don't want to do too much mix in here as soon as the flour disappears that's it it'll look like that which is too soft to work with so we're gonna wrap it in plastic and we're gonna refrigerate this hopefully overnight at least four or five hours but overnight's better and you'll notice the next day it's pretty much firmed up and will let us form our dumplings but before we unwrap this and start that process we need to do two things we're going to bring some salted water to a boil now i'm using a shallow saucepan here so you can see what i'm doing you can use a stock pot if you want of course and we're also going to melt some butter in a non-stick pan next to that water so just use medium heat as soon as the butter melts turn off the flame until needed all right and now the fun part to shape our gnocchi we're going to use two tablespoons the first one i'm gonna stick in there i'm gonna grab about i don't know maybe a teaspoon teaspoon and a half of mixture and i'm gonna use the second spoon to push it off into the boiling water so very simple process first spoon scoops a little second spoon pushes it off into the boiling salted water now here's some good news no matter how bad a job you think you're doing at this it's going to look awesome when it's cooked gnocchi hate anxiety okay they don't respond well so i need you to relax and actually have some fun while you're doing this all right so our heat's on high we're going to do these in batches i usually do about 12 to 15 at a time i'm doing a few less here just for the camera and like a minute or two they're gonna float to the top and once they flow to the top i let them boil another minute so this whole thing only takes a couple minutes per batch and after they floated to the top and cook for another minute i fish them out with one of these strainers right into my butter and you can just let them sit there until you're ready for final service and be sure to read the blog post where i explain what to do if you don't want to cook these right away but i do so i'm going to go ahead and crank my heat up to medium high and what we're going to do is we're simply gonna brown these in the butter maybe three four minutes per side you have to be the judge but basically we want a nice golden brown crust and a light creamy center all right while that's happening i'm gonna go ahead and season these with some black pepper some cayenne and another pinch of salt all right and after three or four minutes i decided mine were perfect to turn all right so you can use tongs for this i'm using two freakishly small wooden spoons by the way yes i believe this is the first time we've had hot freakishly small wooden spoon on freakishly small wooden spoon action so that's kind of cool alright so i flip those over carefully and we're gonna give them a few minutes on the other side and while that's happening the last ingredient i'm gonna throw in some thinly sliced sage leaves which just works so amazingly perfect with this dish so the sage went in i gave it another two minutes or so and at this point my senses of sight sound and smell told me hey these are done let's eat i remove those to a warm plate i'm just doing little appetizer sized portions i'm going to spoon a little bit of that browned butter over all right you don't need much like a teaspoon's fine was that maybe 30 or 40 calories everyone relax i'm gonna hit it with some parmesan cheese and there you go just unbelievably delicious that outside is golden brown slightly crisp from that parmesan kind of crusting up the inside impossibly light tender and delicious so i hope you give those a try this would make a fantastic first course for any winter fall dinner especially around the holidays so anyway head over to foodwishes.com for all the ingredient amounts and more information as usual and as always enjoy [Music] grilled patty pan squash with chorizo vinaigrette that's right thanks to a recent trip to farmer's market i found myself in possession of some really gorgeous summer squash which i was originally going to stuff with chorizo but because of the variance in shapes and sizes i decided to go with this instead and not only did this come out very very delicious but it was extremely simple in fact there's actually more words in the title than there are ingredients in the recipe and when it comes to simple summer dishes like this that's usually a very good thing so first up let's go ahead and prep our patty pan squash and for that all we need to do is basically cut these in half which is pretty easy for the shorter fatter ones so being very careful because squash can be slippery we will try to find the center which is going to be on one side or the other of that scalloped edge and we'll simply cut it in two and then if you want and i do we can do a little trimming to either end and that's pretty much it so like i said very simple for the ones that are shaped like that but where this does get a little tricky is if you have larger flatter ones like this oh yeah that's going to be too dangerous to try to cut straight down there's just not a safe place to grip it or i guess we could go this way but that's not easy either so here's what i suggest i like to take a small sharp knife and just cut in about an inch deep right into that scalloped edge and then i'll just rotate it cutting it all the way around and again i'm only going about an inch deep and once we've scored it around the circumference like that all we have to do is flip it over and safely finish the cut through the middle and that's it and like i said if you want you can trim off the ends it's more of an aesthetic thing but anyway using one or both of those techniques we're going to cut our squash in half at which point we're going to lay some paper towel down on a sheet pan and place down our patty pans cut side up and give them a nice generous sprinkling of salt and not only is that salt going to help season this incredibly bland vegetable but it's also going to draw out some water which we call them the business squash tears and that's actually going to help concentrate some of the flavor so like i said we'll salt our squash and we'll let it sit out for about 15 minutes and while that's happening let's go over to the stove and start what we're calling a chorizo vinaigrette so i'm going to place a heavy skillet down on medium heat into which i've drizzled a little bit of olive oil and then i'm going to crumble in about six ounces of fresh chorizo okay we're using the raw ground freezer for this not the cured spanish sausage style very important and all we're going to do for about the next 10 minutes is cook this over medium heat until it's very well browned and broken down into as small pieces as we can get and as you can see i'm accomplishing that by breaking it up with this wooden spatula and you really can't get this too small so we really do want to get in there and break this up really really fine and don't be surprised if you get a little bit of caramelization a little bit of a fond as we call it forming on the bottom of the pan you want that that's a good thing but anyway like i said we're going to continue to cook that and crumble that until we have something that looks like this at which point we can turn off our heat and dump in our oil and our vinegar and by the way if that sounds a little strange i have three words for you hot bacon dressing all right so this is nothing new precedents have been set and delicious ones at that so we'll stir in our oil and vinegar and believe it or not that's pretty much it that's the beauty of using chorizo which is pretty much fully seasoned we will however add one last ingredient which is going to be some freshly sliced mint and that's going to add a nice little freshness a little bit of sweetness in the background so we will stir in our mint and our chorizo vinaigrette is done and then all we're going to do is set that aside until our squash is grilled and ready to be drenched with its goodness so we'll set that aside and head back over to our squash which have been sitting down for 15 minutes now and at this point they're ready to grill but what we'll want to do first is take a paper towel and blot off any of that excess moisture from the surface you know we try not to put wet things down on grills so we'll blot off all the moisture that salt drew out at which point we'll head out to the grill to cook these up and i'm going to be grilling mine over mesquite which if you're interested is my favorite kind of natural lump charcoal and we'll place those down and grill them for i don't know three or four minutes per side or until just barely tender and because i have them i'm also going to grill up a couple jimmy nardello peppers which i thought would make for a nice garnish and because we have such a wide variety of sizes and shapes you're just going to have to keep an eye on everything and pull them off as they finish all right we don't want them still raw and crunchy nor do we want them soft and mushy so let's shoot for perfection and what we're looking for is signs that moisture's starting to kind of bubble up to the surface all right can you see that that's a really good sign you're just about there and if we take the tongs and kind of give it a squeeze the is no longer stiff and hard but there's a little bit of a give to it and obviously if you want to give these the old polka poke with a knife or a fork you can check that way and i should mention we really do want to get a nice char on these believe it or not the bitterness in those black grill marks is exactly the thing that brings out the sweetness and vegetables cook this way so we'll go ahead and we'll grill up our squash and then once our squash are grilled to perfection we will head back inside for final assembly so let's go ahead and transfer those into some kind of attractive serving platter and we will top that with our warm chorizo vinaigrette which by the way if you've made a head you've reheated with maybe a little splash of water so we'll go ahead and we'll spoon over that amazingly beautiful amazingly flavorful chorizo vinaigrette and of course we want to make sure every one of those squash gets a nice dousing and then once that was set i went ahead and finished up with my grill peppers which i will admit are for decoration just between you and me i think i'm going to use those for an omelette tomorrow although they would be absolutely delicious in this and we'll finish off a little more fresh mint and for whatever reason if you're not into mint italian parsley would also work very well here you are the chris bosh of your summer squash and speaking of the heat this is one of those dishes that's great hot warm or room temperature and actually i've never had a cold but it's probably good cold too and i realize there's not a lot of competition but that my friends was the most delicious summer squash dish maybe i've ever had and because we totally cheated and used something as flavorful as chorizo this really only required a couple other ingredients so if you're one of these people that thinks there's no way you could turn boring bland petty pans into something extraordinarily delicious i think from this video you'll realize that myth has been squashed so i really do hope you give these a try head over to foodwishes.com for all the ingredient amounts and more info as usual and as always enjoy [Music] summer squash and sausage stew that's right this is another installment in our long running series what the heck am i supposed to do with all these summer squash and this time we're utilizing a super simple tomatoey potatoey sausage stew in which to hide the aforementioned squash and oh man did it work beautifully so check this out this was absolutely delicious so i have a couple andouille sausage those are lightly smoked pork sausage a little spicy i have some round green summer squash some yellow zucchini and what they call white or silver zucchini so step one i'm gonna slice up the sausage so i cut those in half and i thought i was gonna do four slices at once but after a couple cuts i realized i'm not cutting them that even so i just went to doing two instead which was much easier so the moral of the story don't be a hero okay so we're gonna slice up our sausage and then of course we're gonna cut up our squash i'm gonna cut the end off i'm gonna cut this in half then i'll use a little angled cut at the bottom to remove that although i think that's optional i'm pretty sure that's not poisonous so up to you and then we're gonna cut each half in half and then across in three sections just like that and you know the drill here once you've picked the size you got to stick with it so try to get as evenly sized pieces as possible that's only because we want it to cook at the same rate all right and even though our zucchini is a different shape than the round squash we're still going to cut off the ends cut it in half all right cut that down the middle and use that first green squash we cut as a guide to get similarly sized pieces so take your time and cut up your squash as uniformly as possible and then besides our sausage and squash we're also going to add some potatoes so i have some yukon gold potatoes that i've peeled and quartered and if you're going low carb those are optional but this stew is 10 to 15 times better with the potatoes and that's not my opinion that is a fact so i'm going to prep those and just leave them in water till needed and at that point we're going to go over to the stove where i have a stew pot on medium high heat a little bit of olive oil i'm going to throw in my andouille sausage and we're going to saute those for about three or four minutes until they begin to caramelize and don't be surprised if it smells really good at this point all right once the edges start to brown we're going to go ahead and dump in a diced onion you can probably lower your heat down to medium at this point and we're just going to sweat those onions with that sausage for about five minutes until they soften and turn translucent they should look something like that and at that point we're going to throw in a whole bunch of garlic and we're only going to cook the garlic for about a minute we don't want it to brown we're just going to give it a quick sizzle and then i like to dump in a little bit of green pepper now you can use green bell pepper but i'm actually using a jalapeno i had in the fridge you know i don't mind the spicy and jalapeno is not even that spicy anyway but i think you do want a little bit of green pepper that little bit of bitterness really brings out the sweetness and the squash in the tomato so i'm going to stir that in next up we're going to add some tomato product i'm using crushed san marzano tomatoes along with some chicken broth and or stock so we'll stir that in at this point you can raise your heat to high because we're going to bring this up to a simmer and while we're waiting for that to happen go ahead and dump in your drained potatoes and of course our squash and don't worry if it doesn't look like there's enough liquid as soon as it starts to cook those squash are going to release a lot of moisture so this will be fine of course having said that with something like this you're always going to adjust your liquid level add a little more stock if you need to so stir that in and while we're waiting for that to come up to temperature we're gonna go ahead and season it with a good dose of salt you know my thoughts on under-seasoned vegetables i'm really not a fan so we're gonna add some salt now of course we're gonna taste and adjust later because we always do we'll also give it a little shot of cayenne and some freshly ground black pepper and other than some fresh parsley at the end that's pretty much it all right so stop me if you've heard this one before what we're gonna do is bring this up to a simmer on high heat and then back the heat down just to maintain a steady simmer alright something like that and all we're gonna do is simply simmer this uncovered until our potatoes and squash are tender and yes our pieces of potato are larger than the squash but that's okay all right those potatoes are gonna take about 30 35 minutes to get tender and that's about the perfect amount of time for the squash also because you don't want these firm all right we don't want it falling apart we still want to identify all the pieces but we want it cooked all the way through because that's going to give us a beautiful mild sweet flavor and also a little bit of the inside of the zucchini will kind of break down and actually thicken our broth but when you think you're getting close you're going to test your potatoes i just use a knife give them the old polka poka all right so when your vegetables are to that perfect point i'm going to go ahead and stir in a handful of fresh italian parsley stir that in and other than checking for final seasoning you're done and ready to serve all right so give it a taste maybe a little more salt probably and once you're happy with it go ahead and spoon that up i mean look at that that is so unbelievably comforting tasty and i'm pretty sure fairly healthy and then for the final touches a light dusting of freshly grated parmesan i really like what that adds to this maybe a little more fresh parsley that's optional but what isn't optional a big slice of crusty bread all right i got a nice piece of walnut bread here just absolutely required for dipping into that amazing broth and yes dipping the bread into the broth might be my favorite part of this although when you get in there with a spoon you're going to see the entire thing is just fantastic like i said the key is cooking that squash enough it'll get sweet and tender the entire stew is infused with that andouille sausage flavor which gets absorbed into those potatoes all right just a really beautiful bowl of food so now when your neighbor rings your doorbell with that basket of squash instead of looking annoyed you will actually smile and be genuinely grateful you're getting them because you could make this all right so i really hope you give that a try head over to foodwishes.com for all the ingredient amounts and more info as usual and as always enjoy [Music] you

Channel: Food Wishes

Views: 97,440

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Id: s0_F1RlJiHA

Length: 54min 15sec (3255 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 09 2022