Southwestern Stuffed Butternut Squash
I am not ashamed to admit that I spend a more than average amount of time on the internet just browsing around other people’s virtual kitchens. I pick out something I need to use up (gochujang paste, anyone?) and see what the world wide web has to say about it. Usually my effort turns up multiple versions of pretty much the same thing. It takes some digging to find one that will actually work with what I have in my kitchen. But, at least as importantly, that I can tell will taste good. For example, if I’m reading a recipe and the ingredient list says “1 clove of garlic” I have already decided that recipe probably isn’t going to work for me because who puts ONE clove of garlic in anything? People who aren’t trying, that’s who.
In any case, that is how I ran across Julia’s Album and her trove of butternut squash recipes. Her photography is simple and beautiful and I knew it was going to be good because she was using chili powder, cumin and smoked paprika. She also has garlic powder in there (which kind of skates around my one clove of garlic rule) but I was right, this one is a winner. We even got The Picky One at the table to eat it and he “didn’t hate it” which is strong praise, my friends. Strong praise, indeed.
I always have beef mince in the freezer so that’s what I used but I think it would be just as good with any mince – lamb, turkey, pork, veggie mince, whatever. It has a lot of flavour and there’s plenty of opportunity to throw in other veggies that need to be used up, too. The whole thing is really versatile and can be made veggie pretty easily. In any case, I feel obligated to point out that I use an entire head of garlic rather than the garlic powder. Which, I think we can all agree, is the right choice here.
Ingredients
Instructions
Preheat your oven to 200/180 fan.
The BUTTERNUT SQUASH needs to be roasted so take the biggest knife you have and CAREFULLY cut the squash the long way so you have two halves that each have seeds in them. Scoop out the seeds and that fleshy stuff. Think about how you’re going to carve your pumpkins in October and get briefly excited.
Put the two squash halves on your baking sheet cut side up. Cut your CLOVE OF GARLIC in half around the middle and put one half into each of the little cups that used to have the seeds and stringy bits. So you’ll have a butternut squash holding half a garlic clove in it’s empty little belly.
Pour some OLIVE OIL over the squash and garlic. SALT and PEPPER it, too. Then hold the garlic in while you flip each squash over so it goes into the oven cut side down. Put in the oven and set the timer for 40 minutes.
While that is roasting, get to work on the stuffing. Start with the MINCE, into a pan with a little OLIVE OIL and on medium heat until it is browned. As always with mince, there will be a stage where there is a lot of meat juice that needs to burn off before the meat will actually brown. It is always worth the wait because you’ll get stronger flavours all together.
While the meat juice is cooking off, drain and rinse the black beans, slice the cherry tomatoes, chop the chili, the green onions and the pepper (and any other veggies you’re adding in).
Once your meat juice has cooked off, add in the CHILI POWDER, CUMIN, SMOKED PAPRIKA and SALT. Give it all a good stir and taste it. What does it need? If you think it needs garlic, hold on, that’s coming but if it needs anything else, add a little more.
Now add in the BLACK BEANS, CHERRY TOMATOES, CHILI, PEPPER, and half of the GREEN ONIONS. Mix that all together and let it cook on medium for about ten minutes then turn down the heat to just keep it warm.
Just about now the SQUASH should be finishing. Take it out of the oven and stick a fork in the middle of it. If it doesn’t yield to the fork all the way through it needs a few more minutes. If it is ready, remove the garlic halves and set them aside. Then scoop the flesh out into a bowl, leaving about 2 cm around the edge so it becomes a little squash boat, ready for the filling.
When the garlic halves are cool enough to handle, squeeze them out into the bowl with the squash flesh. Say that five times fast while you are mashing them together. Then add that back to the meat mixture.
Turn the heat back up and get everything warm again. Take half of your chopped CORIANDER and stir it through. Now taste again and make any changes you want. The addition of the squash will dial down everything you did before so don’t be afraid to get those spices out again. And the salt.
Here’s the stuffing part! Take your filling and put it into your squash halves. It will be generous and spilling out the sides, gloriously. Sprinkle the top with your SHREDDED CHEESE. (I took the picture above pre-cheese because cheese is a personal choice.) Put the whole thing back in the oven for about 15 minutes or until you get that golden, cheesy crust.
We serve it with some dollops of SOUR CREAM, the rest of the CORIANDER, the rest of the GREEN ONIONS and a SQUEEZE of LIME. If you have some tortilla chips around they are great on the side to scoop up all the extra filling that tries to get away.
Hmmmm….on closer inspection of the photo above, it seems I also put some onion in the mix. I put onion in most things so that shouldn’t surprise me but if you don’t love it or don’t have one, it will be good without it, too.
