Recipes: Using Local Squash and Pumpkins

We've already seen our share of snow, and winter is not even half over. So, to keep your spirits high and to warm your souls, here are a couple of recipes using local squash and pumpkin from the North Fork. If you can't find local, grocery store squash will suffice.

Local Acorn Squash with Bacon, Mushroom & Onion Stuffing

You'll need:

• Local acorn squashes or small butternut squashes, cut in half
• Dried stuffing mix (dried bread cubes with herb seasoning)
• Onions
• Raw bacon, cut into pieces about a half to 3/4 inch long
• Mushrooms, sliced or chopped. Fresh shiitake are good, but any kind will suffice
• Fresh herbs, chopped

Cut up the onions and start cooking in a large frying pan on a low heat for about a half hour until they are soft and start to caramelize. Put the cut bacon into the frying pan as well and stir. Add the sliced mushroom, and cook everything together for about 10 minutes. Add some chopped fresh herbs.

Meanwhile, make the stuffing according to the package. You probably only need to use about half the box for this recipe. Add the amount of hot water that they say, and butter, if the box calls for it.

Mix the stuffing together with the onion/bacon/mushroom/herb mixture.

Put the acorn squash halves cut side up on a baking sheet. Put some stuffing into the indentation on the face of each half. If there is leftover stuffing, don't worry, it can be eaten separately.

Cover the entire baking sheet of squash halves with aluminum foil. This is so the squashes can cook till soft, without drying out the stuffing. Put the baking sheet into the oven at 325 degrees and cook for about 45 minutes. When it starts to smell cooked, you can take off the foil and cook for another 10 minutes or so.

Serve face up, either one to a person, or share them.

Oven Roasted Pumpkin or Squash

Don't use Halloween-type orange pumpkins for this; use the local cheese pumpkins, which are beige. You can also use butternut or acorn or other squash.

This one calls for peeling the raw pumpkin or squash, then cutting it up into chunks of about 1 inch by 1 inch. I hate doing this because I find the pumpkins hard to peel, hard to cut, and slippery, to the point where it can be dangerous. I have sometimes cheated by cutting the pumpkin into very big pieces and then steaming them for a little while to get them a little soft so that they are easier to peel and cut into smaller pieces, but I do not recommend that here, since roasting is key to this recipe. Just be patient and don't rush it.

After peeling and cutting the pumpkin into 1 inch, square chunks, put them onto a baking sheet or in a large shallow au gratin dish. Drizzle olive oil over the pieces and stir to coat. Add salt, pepper, fresh herbs and chopped onion, shallots and/or chives. Add small bits of pork bellies, or use raw bacon. Place into the oven at 325 degrees on an upper rack and cook for about 45 minutes.

Local Pumpkin Soup

The best pumpkin soup I ever had was in southwest France this past March, in the area near Gascony, the land of ducks, geese, confit de canard (duck legs) and foie gras. My husband and I were staying at a B&B in the countryside, and the B&B owner offered to cook us dinner as well. The hosts served us confit de canard, and soup from the local French pumpkins, the potirons, which are large, flat and beige and look somewhat similar to the cheese pumpkins we have on Long Island.

In the U.S., I'd always had pumpkin soup that was creamy or pureéd, but this was not. The pumpkin was in chunks of about 1 inch by 1 inch in size. There were also other things floating in this soup, which I didn't recognize, and I asked what they were. "Oh, leeks, other vegetables," ... the hostess didn't even remember. The broth, or base, was delicious, I had never tasted any broth like it before. The hostess said it was organic vegetable bouillon cubes. I've never seen them in the U.S., but she said it was available at the French supermarkets. I did get some, as well as organic chicken bouillon cubes, to bring home.

The next time I make a pumpkin soup, I will make it the way I had in France – with chunks of pumpkin, some cut up leeks, maybe a little garlic, and fresh herbs from my garden, probably sage, since that is still growing in the winter. And a good stock as a base.