Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola

December 9, 2012 by 8 Comments

Soup sounds simple, but it is deceptively so. For me, it’s important that the soup have structure and depth of flavor- that it’s not just a liquified puree and/or a bunch of swollen vegetables and meat. The way each spoonful feels texturally in your mouth and the flavors that are briefly there as it passes on your tongue and lingers afterward need to combine to be memorable.

I think this soup meets those above criteria I have, and is worth the time to create rather than from the store pre-made in a container. I happened to make homemade mascarpone, but you can certainly just purchase it to save some of the prep work.

Ingredients (for 6 people):

  • 2 teaspoons of extra virgin olive oil
  • 3 cups of stock- I used vegetable stock
  • 1/2 cup of diced white onion
  • 1/4 cup of diced celery
  • 1/4 cup of diced carrots
  • 1/2 cup of an ale or you can also use hard cider. I used Sam Adams Dunkelweizen
  • 1 cinnamon stick
  • 1/4 tablespoon of ground coriander
  • 2 pounds of peeled, seeded, chopped butternut squash
  • 1/2 cup of Mascarpone cheese, or make your own using 2 cups of cream and 1/8 teaspoon of tartaric acid as I did. This will yield 2 cups of Mascarpone.
  • 1/2 cup of Cambozola
  • 1 cup of cream – you can also use sour cream or some of the yield of the homemade Mascarpone (I did the latter)
  • 1/2 cup of water
  • 1 cup of sugar
  • 1 tablespoon of ground cinnamon
  • 2 cups of whole almonds- they should be raw, not roasted
  • To Taste: salt, and pepper

Directions:

  1. If you are making homemade mascarpone, start with this step first the night before. Heat the 2 cups of cream in a saucepan to 180 degrees F over medium high heat, stirring and making sure it does not scorch. As soon it reaches 180 degrees F, remove from heat immediately and stir in the tartaric acid. You can find tartaric acid in the baking section of your grocery store, or you can go to a home brew or home wine store.
    Continue stirring for 1-2 minutes, and then transfer to a glass or plastic container and refrigerate for at least 2 hours so it can thicken. You can set a sieve over a bowl and line it with cheesecloth and pour in the mascarpone and let drain for an additional 10 hours in the refrigerator… This yields 2 cups of mascarpone cheese.
    making mascarpone recipe homemade making making homemade mascarpone
  2. Heat the olive oil in a saucepan, while in a large pot that is at least 2.5 quarts, you heat up the stock. In the saucepan, add in the mirepoix – aka the onion, celery, and carrots- and sweat them until they are soft
    mirepoix mirepoix
  3. Meanwhile, watch your pot with stock. Once the stock is boiling, turn down the heat to low and add the beer, cinnamon, and coriander and let it simmer to develop the flavor for about 5 minutes. Then add in the mirepoix and the squash and continue to cook, uncovered, for the next 25-30 minutes. The squash should start to get mushy and fall apart and incorporate into the liquid.
    For my ale, I chose to use Samuel Adams Dunkelweizen, which was one of the beers offered on one of their seasonal variety packs. I picked the Dunkelweizen because it is a dark wheat beer brewed with Bavarian yeast that has flavors and aromas of clove and nutmeg with a tiniest hint of citrus and finished with malted wheat, so sounded like it would be a good mix with the rest of the vegetables and seasonings.
    Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola
  4. Remove the pot from heat and remove the cinnamon stick and let the soup cool until it is warm. You don’t want it to be hot because you are about to puree everything!
  5. In the meantime, combine the water, sugar, and cinnamon in a saucepan over medium heat and bring to a boil and then add the almonds.
    Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola
  6. Cook and stir the almond/sugar water mixture until the liquid evaporates and leaves a syrup-like coating on the almonds. Pour the almonds onto a baking sheet lined with waxed paper and flatten to help the almonds cool. Cool for about 15 minutes- and it is totally ok to sneak a few warm nuts as a snack! This is more than you will need to garnish the soup, but it will probably be gone in just a day or so (a handful at a time- because you can’t just have a couple), so don’t hesitate to make this amount.
    I know right, super easy! This will smell so good too. I always want to get these whenever I smell those little carts selling paper cones of candied nuts and you can eat them warm if you’d like. Or, you can add them like I did to soup. or to salad, or mix it with pretzels and peanut butter chips or chex etc. for a snack mix. I used almonds, but you can use any nut you’d like. You can also add vanilla or chili/cayenne/hot sauce for additional seasonings instead of cinnamon.
    Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola
  7. Once the soup so far is cool enough, mix in a blender on high in batches to puree the soft vegetables until smooth.
    Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola
  8. Take out the mascarpone and the cambozola and let it warm to room temperature.  You will then mix the 1/2 cup of the mascarpone with 1/2 cup of the cambozola to make a cheese mixture
    Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola
  9. Warm the soup at low heat, stirring 1 cup of the mascarpone, until it is at a temperature to serve (definitely do not get to boiling). You can also just use another substitute to make the soup creamier in texture and taste, such as light sour cream or tofutti- I didn’t have another use for the rest of the mascarpone and decided to use it here but the soup definitely missed the cream. Instead, use the rest of the mascarpone to make tiramisu or with fruit or in other desserts, try to use it in a few days while it is fresh and has that subtle sweetness.
  10. When serving, sprinkle the candied almonds on top of the soup and garnish with the cheese mixture. How pretty and fancy!
    Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola Butternut Squash and Ale Soup with Candied Almonds and homemade Mascarpone with Cambozola

Making the candied almonds makes your place smell so festive with the cinnamon scent! The optional step of making homemade mascarpone is extra credit but also pays off as  you will taste how fresh and subtle the sweetness can be, and the garnish of the mascarpone cambozola cheese allows you to add just a touch of creaminess and cambozola is a nice mix of the richness combining the butteryness of a brie type cheese but with a bit of tangy punch akin to blue cheese. Using the squash makes this soup so seasonal too, and the ale gives you the ability to give this a depth of flavor beyond just the average butternut squash soup.

I started to get a cold (sore throat, sniffles, cough) a little bit after making this soup and having this for lunch was so comforting. Whether you are feeling sick or not, it’s a nourishing remedy for the dark cold days this time of year and a perfect holiday soup that is wonderful for all winter season.

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Fresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta Shells

June 20, 2011 by 1 Comment

For someone who loves food, and enjoys cheese, and pork, and enrichment of flavors often thanks to fat, trying to make a dish that does not contain much fat and is not too cheesy and is vegetarian but tastes good is an interesting challenge in trying to please a fussy vegetarian palate instead of what I would personally pick.

I had a craving for fresh ricotta and decided to make stuffed shells for dinner. In order to make it vegetarian and not “overloaded” with cheese (I love it with multiple kinds of cheese myself) or too rich, I didn’t follow any recipe that called for sausage or egg, and only used the ricotta, which turns out is most of them. So I decided to wing it. To add more flavor rather then just ricotta in shells, I decided to use butternut squash and baby zucchini, heirloom tomatoes, and fresh chopped sage and dill from the herb garden.

Ingredients: (enough for 4 people as a main dish, 6 as a side)

  • 1 gallon of whole milk. It needs to be not be ultra-pasteurized
  • 1 pint of buttermilk
  • 1 box of large shell pasta
  • 2.5 cups of cubed butternut squash
  • 5 baby zucchini, chopped
  • 3 tablespoons of sage, chopped. As an optional step you can brown the sage with butter first for extra flavor
  • One jar of marinara sauce of your choice
  • 2 tablespoons of dill
  • 1 pint of heirloom cherry tomatoes
  • 1/4 cup of Italian seasoned breadcrumbs or parmesan cheese as topping

Directions:

It is important that you don’t use Ultra-Pasteurized milk, because it does not have the important calcium chloride which is needed for coagulation and curds (the pasteurization process removes calcium). Whole milk is better because it will also taste richer, as the flavor of the cheese is related to the amount of butterfat in the milk.

  1. First, I heated up the gallon of whole milk and a pint of buttermilk under medium heat. I kept stirring with a wooden spoon to make sure none burned at the bottom and no skin would form at the top, and would also monitor the temperature once in a while. It only needs to reach 175 degrees Farenheit. As it heats up, you can watch the curdles start to form, and the white curds begin to separate from the yellowish liquid whey.
    Fresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta Shells Fresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta Shells
  2. Once it reaches the desired temperature, take it immediately off the heat, and using a slotted spoon, I started moving the curds onto a strainer that had cheesecloth sitting on another pot to drain more whey. This whole first step maybe took 20 minutes, and then let the whey drain for another 15 minutes or so.
  3. As it is draining, at the same time boil another pot of water in which I placed 25 shells, cooked al dente, and then drained them and quickly ran some cold water on them.
    Fresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta Shells Fresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta Shells
  4. As I was waiting for the ricotta and whey to drain some more, I steamed some cubed butternut squash (a little more then 2.5 cups probably once cubed) and five baby zucchini, which I then chopped up, along with the sage (maybe 3 tablespoons chopped). Mix these all together. If I had any lemon juice I might have added some in, but unfortunately someone drank it all. Something I thought of afterwards is that I could have browned the sage in a little bit of butter first- I love browned butter sage as it is a little crunchy. I restrained from adding spice this time because I wanted to let the flavors of the vegetables shine.
    Fresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta Shells
  5. Finally, the assembly time. While pre-heating the oven to 350 F, I first poured some basil marinara (from a jar thanks to Trader Joe’s) onto a 9×13 baking dish. Then, I would basically put a tablespoon of the ricotta/vegetable mixture into each shell, and line them up. The fact that after they were cooked I had immediately ran cold over them and separated each kept every shell intact.
  6. After they were all filled, I topped the whole dish with the remaining sauce. Next, sprinkle the dill (I used about 2 tablespoons), and this is when I added the heirloom tomatoes basically between every shell- the ones I had were all about cherry tomato size.
  7. Sprinkle some Italian seasoned breadcrumbs instead of more cheese (which again, would be my preference- that way it gets all bubbly crunchy with a bit of burnt parmesan cheese), and bake in the oven for about 40 minutes.

Fresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta ShellsFresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta Shells  Fresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta ShellsFresh Ricotta, butternut squash, baby zucchini in Pasta Shells

Seriously, making ricotta is so easy, and you get so much more yield for the same dollar then if you bought a container (maybe 25 oz, instead of the packaged 15 oz). And it tastes so much better, perhaps like me you will be ruined and no longer like what it tastes like coming from a container.

After all this, the fussy vegetarian pulled out nutritional yeast in order to add a bit more nutty cheesy flavor! What a loser.  ^_^ I had to say though, overall the dish ended up tasting pretty good and I didn’t miss the other cheeses or egg that other stuffed shell recipes use, and I think these were better veggies then spinach as stuffing- I prefer spinach in pasta with simpler sauces so you can taste the spinach instead of just the texture which gets overwhelmed by tangy marinara. Also the bursts of flavor and juice from the heirloom tomatoes are always awesome.

And, there is still leftover ricotta so I can use it inside endive leaves, or as topping on slow-roasted roma tomatoes with a bit of olive oil and dot or so of aged balsamic, the next couple days. Great for some cooler temperature snacks as the weather heats up as summer if arriving in Portland this week with a return to 80 degrees (only the 2nd time this year so far), and summer officially starts tomorrow.

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