Friday, November 2, 2007

Dark Days Dinner #1

Happy Halloween!

We did our first Dark Days Dinner Challenge dinner for Halloween night. It wasn't anything to fancy, but it was a good healthy dinner to offset all the candy that made its way into our house.

Pumpkin Soup in a pumpkin, an old Julia Child recipe that I found on Saveur's site
Salad w/ radishes, radicchio, arugula, lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, onion and parsley, all from my CSA box and the farmer's market
Acme Pain au Levain and an assortment of cheeses

I found this recipe for the soup on Saveur.com. It was pretty good, the gruyere and spices were the only not local parts.

1 7-lb. Cinderella pumpkin, with a 2" stem (I couldn't find a local Cinderella pumpkin so I used a Jack O Lantern pumpkin instead)
7 tbsp. butter
Salt
1 large yellow onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 1⁄2 cups fresh white bread crumbs, toasted
1⁄2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1⁄2 tsp. ground sage
Freshly ground black pepper
1⁄2 cup grated Swiss cheese
4 cups Chicken Stock
2 bay leaves
1⁄2 cup heavy cream, optional

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Cut a lid about 4" in diameter out of top of pumpkin and set lid aside. Remove and discard seeds and strings. Rub inside of pumpkin and lid with 1 tbsp. softened butter, season with salt, and place on a baking pan.

2. Melt remaining 6 tbsp. butter in a skillet over medium heat. Add onions and cook until soft, about 10 minutes. Stir in bread crumbs and cook for 2 minutes, then add nutmeg and sage and season generously with salt and pepper. Remove from heat, stir in cheese, then spoon mixture into pumpkin. Pour enough stock into pumpkin to come within 1⁄2" of the rim. Lay bay leaves on top, then fit lid onto pumpkin.

3. Bake until pumpkin begins to soften and brown on the outside and the stock bubbles on the inside, about 1 1⁄2 hours. Carefully remove from oven and transfer to a serving platter. With a long-handled spoon, scrape flesh from bottom and sides of pumpkin and, just before serving, stir in heavy cream if using.

It was really good!

1 comment:

Unknown said...

you should post a picture of the soup-in-pumpkin! it was so pretty.