The Hunts - Day 23 - Guests

Nate and Kate are our friends. This May-October, we shared our Oxbow Farm CSA box with them. Last week was the last box of the season, and we ended up with the whole thing because I spaced out on corridinating the pick up with Kate. To make up for it, we invited them over for dinner. Turns out, though, I didn't really cook too many items from the box, but oh well.

I made Jen's smothered pork, the rustic onion tart I posted about earlier in the week, roasted beets salad, and a greens salad. We also had a half a loaf of Essential Bakery's whole wheat bread with Beecher's Blank Slate Tapenade, along with a little homemade (but not by me) plum jam & quince paste. We had a bottle of Chinook Wines' 2006 Yakima Valley Cabernet Franc, and started on a bottle of Desert Wind Cabernet Sauvignon. It really felt like a feast. We haven't had dinner guests in ages, and it felt so good to do something like this. I really do love a nice, homemade, sit down dinner with friends.

For the pork, I made it in a crock pot instead of dutch oven (I don't own a dutch oven, sadly). Rather than starting the braising liquid with butter & flour, I started it with butter, onions and garlic. I sauteed them a minute or so, then added the flour, let that cook another minute, and whisked in the chicken stock. I seared the meat, placed it in the crock pot & poured in the braising liquid, being sure to get some on top of the meat. I let it cook on low for half the day, from about 9:30am-2:30pm. At that point, I turned the heat up to high and let it go for another couple hours. Once the liquid was reduced and skimmed of fat, I strained it. Since we were having an onion tart for dinner, I didn't feel like we needed the onions for the meat.

For the tart, I used the Martha Stewart pate brisee recipe instead of the one from Simply Recipes. I ommitted the sugar for this dough.

Everything turned out great. Everyone ate a bunch, and I was amazed at how much bread and tapenade Vincent ate!

The Hunts - Day 22

Whole Roasted Chicken - For some reason, it always takes me way longer to roast a chicken than I think it would, no matter what. Tonight was no exception. But, in the end, we all got to eat some, even if it came out after we started dinner.

I love roasted chicken for several reasons: a) it's easy to make; except for my timing always being off, b) it's so tasty, and c) LEFTOVERS!

This chicken was stuffed with a shallot, a carrot, a celery, a quarter of a lemon, 2 large garlic cloves, thyme and rosemary. It was a bit much, and I could barely get those little legs to close up. I also seasoned the cavity with salt & pepper before stuffing it. I opted not to do much with the outside, just salt & pepper.

I placed the chicken in a baking dish, covered it loosely with foil, and roasted it in the oven at 375 degrees F for 30 minutes, then turned up the heat to 425 degrees F for another 30 minutes with the foil off. That wasn't enough. It ended up needing more time with the foil on, and then off again; a total of 15-20 minutes. The problem was that I should have just cooked it at 425 degrees F for one hour, like my friend, Robin told me. But, I was trying to multi-task the oven space. I wanted to roast beets and sweet potatoes, but they roast at a lower temperature. Oh well, like I said, in the end we all ate some of it, and everyone was happy. And, it had a beautiful golden, crispy skin, while staying juicy inside. Thank you, Thundering Hooves for raising a lovely chicken!

We had roasted sweet potato, sauteed kale with carrots & onions, and brown rice with our chicken (er, uh, before the chicken).

The Hunts - Day 21

Chicken Pesto Pasta - I had some pesto sauce I made a month or so ago that I froze. I decided it was time to use it up, since I didn't quite know what to make for dinner. This turned out to be a pretty yummy, easy meal because we had 1/2 box of rigatoni, a chicken breast, and some frozen peas all on hand. And, that's pretty much what all went into the dish.

This is not the pesto recipe I made, but for the sake of posting a recipe, try this out (and you can let me know if it's any good). http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/001329fresh_basil_pesto.php

I served the pasta with a side of baby greens with candied walnuts & dried cranberries and a blackberry vinaigrette.

Pokin' Around On-line...

...I found this: http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/007341cooking_on_a_budget.php
I've only looked at a few recipes on the actual website, but I thought I'd share this because she seems to have some good ideas. Including this one: http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/002135rustic_onion_tart.php
I'm thinking of making this tart later in the week. During toddler naptime today, I decided to "get ahead" with some grating of cheeses and I made a batch of Martha Stewart's pate brisee.

From that first link, I found this: http://hungerchallenge.blogspot.com/ , which has people spending $3 a day per person. That's gotta be tough.

Which brings me to how our 30 Day Dinner Challenge has impacted the Hunt family financially. So far, our most expensive meal at home has cost us about $18.32. I've been saving our shopping receipts to help break down the cost of each meal, but it's been tricky. Some items used were purchased or made pre-challenge, such as a can of beans, or some chicken stock that I made and froze. Then, there are things like a cup of carrots; the carrots come from our CSA, which comes in a bunch in a box of other vegetables, and I don't have a breakdown of what each vegetable costs. Or, stuff like butter, salt, pepper, olive oil, etc. I leave the costs of those out, unless it's a large amount, like butter for tart dough. Or, there are things like a tablespoon of dried cranberries or a 1/4 cup of toasted pecans that are tossed into a salad. I just take a guess, especially if it was bought last month.

Some of the ingredients that drive up the cost of a meal aren't what you would expect. Our $18.32 meal was a panade. [I was just going to link that word so that you can see what it is, but it looks like what I've thought of as "panade" actually isn't what it is. So, my version is basically sort of a bread casserole. It's hearty, comforting, and yummy.] What made this panade so expensive was the bread. I had a mix of different partial loaves of artisan breads in my freezer, including a cherry pumpernickle from Tall Grass Bakery. Although I only used about 1/3 of that loaf, it was a $10 loaf of bread. YIKES!

Then, there are ingredients like cheese. The gruyere cheese I bought at $12.99/pound amounts to $.81/ounce. An ounce here, and ounce there, and you've spent a few bucks!

So, at the end of all this, I do plan to attempt to breakdown my grocery bills, and take into account our Thundering Hooves meat orders and Oxbow Farm CSA, and try to make some sense of how this challenge has affected our pocketbook. It's just an extra something I want to do for my family. My hunch is that cooking at home is more affordable, but by how much?

The Hunts - Day 20 - TEN MORE DAYS TO GO!!!!

LEFTOVERS!

And, I want to put in a plug for the Northwest Tofu Inc., at 1913 Jackson Street, between 23rd Ave and Rainier Ave. I've been told by many of my Chinese friends that this is the place to go for Taiwanese-style breakfast goodies, but I have just now made it there to see for myself. OMG! It's awesome. The only time I get this kind of stuff is when I go back to L.A. to visit my family. Now, I can get it all the time! The bonus is that their sesame pancake with Chinese doughnut is better than at the usual place near my parents. We got there around 9:30 A.M., ordered too much food, got very full, skipped lunch, and had the leftovers (theme for today) as a snack in the afternoon.

Some of this may sound odd to people who have not had this kind of stuff for breakfast, but here's what we ordered:
-sesame pancake with Chinese doughnut
-an extra order of Chinese doughnut (though we didn't really need it)
-egg wrapped in scallion pancake
-pan fried pork bun
-sweet sticky rice roll (which is actually not sweet)
-sweet soy milk

We didn't order any tofu, but two other tables did, which must mean it's good; there were only 3 other tables during the time we were in there, and one hadn't gotten their food yet by the time we left, so they may have ordered tofu, too.

The Hunts - Day 19

Chicken Noodle Soup - YUM!
Saute onions, carrots, and celery on medium heat. Deglaze with white wine, reduce wine by half. Add chicken stock to cover vegetables. Bring to a boil. Add small diced chicken breast and sprig of thyme. Bring back to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and allow to cook until vegetables are tender and chicken is fully cooked. Add cooked pasta. Season with salt and pepper.

I added the leftover pasta from last night's dinner, instead of a new batch of cooked pasta. This included the vegetables and sausage that were in the pasta.

The Hunts - Day 18

Sausage Pasta
I had some sausage leftover from last night. It comes in a pack of 4, so I just cooked them all off.

Cook the pasta of your choice, as per instructions on the box. Cut the sausage in half, lengthwise, and then slice into pieces. While the pasta is cooking, saute your vegetables:
1/2 red onion, sliced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 small fennel bulb, sliced thinly
1 small sweet pepper, sliced thinly
*I sauteed these in oil on medium high heat, deglazed with white wine, and then added one bunch of kale (cleaned & cut). Once the kale is fully wilted, I added sauteed mushrooms (left from my French dip sandwiches) & the sausage.

When the pasta is cooked, toss it together with the vegetables/sausages, add chopped parsley, and adjust seasoning as needed.

The Hunts - Day 17

Stuffed Squash
A friend made us something similar to this a few years ago, and I never go the actual recipe, so I just improvised. I'm thinking that it can be done in other, similar ways, and with different winter squashes.

I picked delicata squash. First, I cut the squash in half, lengthwise. Then, I dug out the seeds, and set them in a baking dish, skin-side down. Ooh, preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Season the squash with salt & pepper.

The stuffing - I tossed all the following items in a bowl with salt, pepper, and extra virgin olive oil:
-raisin bread, cut into 1/4" chunks
-onions, carrots, celery (mirepoix), cut into 1/4" dice
-one Thundering Hooves sweet Italian sausage, partially cooked, and diced 1/4"
-one apple, peeled, diced 1/4"

Put the stuffing into the squash, cover with foil, and roast in the oven for about 45 minutes, or until squash is tender.

The Hunts - Day 16

Taco Bake - My friend, Lucy, introduced me to this concept of a taco casserole. I've never actually had her version of it, but this is what mine consisted of tonight:

*layer 1 - black beans
*layer 2 - ground beef cooked with a little bit of garlic & taco seasoning
*layer 3 - salsa
*layer 4 - cheddar cheese
*layer 5 - chopped scallions
*layer 6 - one whole wheat tortilla
REPEAT
*topped off with a little more cheddar cheese

I had made this earlier in the afternoon & set it in the fridge until close to dinner time. To reheat, I wrapped the dish in foil & baked it for 30 minutes at 350 degrees F.

The Hunts - Day 14 & 15 - "Rescue Me" Quiche & "French" Night

Yes, we have actually been cooking at home still, even though I have slacked on the postings! So far we have missed just one day, and we are now halfway through our challenge today!

Here is what made it to the table the past few days:
*Day 11 - beet greens and onion panade
*Day 12 - fried eggrolls (we took as a potluck item to a farm party) & Red Baron French bread pizza (frozen; but when we got home from the party, we weren't that hungry, yet needed a little something)
*Day 13 - pork chops, sauteed kale with carrots & onions, steamed broccoli, green salad with lemon cucumber, fennel, extra-virgin olive oil, and banyuls vinegar. Easy marinade for the chops (also good for roasted chicken): white wine, Dijon mustard (can also add stone ground mustard), salt & pepper; adjust amounts as needed. I stuck the chops in a Ziplock bag, threw the marinade inside, shook it around, and let it sit in the fridge until ready to cook. Seared the pork chops with a little canola oil for 1-2 minutes on each side and put the whole pan (all stainless steel, no nonstick pans or rubber handles, please) in the oven at 375 F for 10-15 minutes. Tender, juicy, delicious.

*Day 14 - "Rescue Me" Quiche -
I locked myself & Vincent out of the house yesterday. It had just stopped hailing when I decided it was time to go grocery shopping. Since we were taking the car & going to park in a garage, not going to dilly dally, I decided we were okay without rain gear or diaper bag. And, apparently, I didn't think keys were necessary, either. DOH!!!

I called Jen, and she so kindly came to our rescue. We went to her house and cooked dinner together. It was a quiche. Here's the recipe: http://smittenkitchen.com/2008/09/spinach-quiche-revisited/

Funny thing, the pate brisee it called for turns out to be the one I posted a couple weeks ago from Martha Stewart. How many moms does it take a make a quiche? In Jen's & my case, two. We will both admit to not being the best quiche cookers. But, together, even with two toddlers screaming at our heels & fighting over toys that they don't really want to play with, we succeeded. And, they were done just in time for David to pick us up. I haven't heard back from Jen if hers was as tasty as mine, but I'm assuming it was.

*Day 15 - Tonight's "French" night will consist of French dip and French onion soup. I even have a French baguette for our sandwiches. I'm actually going to put onions, cheese, & mushrooms on our sandwiches as well. I got these little soup crocks with handles from QFC last night, too, that I'm so excited to use! The soup is made (thank goodness for toddler naptime) & the sandwiches should be pretty quick to assemble this afternoon. I should go chop some garlic for the mushrooms...maybe grate some gruyere cheese...

smothered pork

well, i blew it and we went out for pizza on friday night. i had a pork shoulder in the fridge and i knew i needed to cook it yesterday or it would go bad. i wasn't feeling it at all. finally at around 2pm i rallied and got cooking. it turned out really yummy. here's what i did:

5-6 lb. pork shoulder roast (bone in)
1 large yellow onion, thinly sliced
8-10 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1-2 T fresh rosemary, chopped
1 T fresh thyme, chopped
2 T veggie oil
1 stick butter (8 T)
1/2 c flour
4 cups stock (i used chicken)
juice from 1/2 lemon

preheat oven to 275. season pork generously with salt and freshly ground pepper. let stand at room temp for about 30 minutes.

combine the onion, garlic, rosemary and thyme in a large bowl.

heat veggie oil in a large dutch oven or stock pot with a lid that will fit in your oven. add the pork and sear until all the sides are a nice crispy brown. transfer the meat to a plate.

melt butter in dutch oven. stir in the flour. cook for 1-2 minutes. add onion mixture and stir until well coated. slowly add the chicken broth. bring to a simmer, stirring constantly.

return the pork (and any accumulated juices) to the pan. cover and put in the oven for about 3 hours. baste the pork hourly. once it's done, remove the pork from the sauce and set aside. while it rests, reduce the sauce until it's super thick and coats the back of a spoon (you may need to scrape fat from the top). add the lemon juice and stir well.

I served it with plain egg noodles and sauteed garlic and kale. the sauce is excellent on top of the pork and noodles. both of my boys ate it up! i actually really enjoyed it too. just had left overs on a sandwich.

now, to plan for this week...

The Hunts - Day 10 & An Interesting Article

After 3 days of bad napping, my son is taking an extra long nap today. This has afforded me the time to do a little catching up on kitchen prep work. I know there's still more I can do, but my pregnant body is tired of standing hunched over the prep table in the kitchen. But, you will be happy for me to know that dinner is on the stove. I'm making some sort of shepard's pie.

I made pot roast a couple weeks ago. After we had our fill of it, I broke up the meat, vaccum sealed it with some of the cooking liquid, and freezed it, with future shepard's pie in mind. I've made the mashed potato topping already, and now I'm just getting my meat & veggies part ready. We shall see...

In the meantime, I found this interesting article that I'd like to share. This makes me feel good about the way I feed my son. http://www.culinate.com/articles/first_person/teaching_kids_to_cook

The Hunts - Disruptions

It's Wednesday. It has already been a heck of a week. Does Wednesday mean it's "hump day" and we're about to get over the hump and see some smooth sailing through the remainder of the week? Hmmmm...

Our major disruption this week has been the installation of our new living room windows. The job was supposed to take 2 days. They will need to come back next week to do some woodwork on the interior, and not all the windows fit, so we need to re-order & wait for them to finish and paint. Not to mention, the weather is getting wetter and wetter.

I will spare you all the details of the other stuff going on this week, but with all of it, we did manage to have dinner at home both Monday and Tuesday evening. Tonight, dinner at home would have been nearly impossible. Okay, that's an exageration, but it would have meant waiting for the construction guys to leave, then clean up all the dust, then cook. All with busy toddler running around, with a 7pm bedtime.

We ate out.

Back on the wagon tomorrow! We asked our handyman not to come tomorrow so that we can have a break from all the chaos.

Monday night, we had chili & tomato soup leftovers. Tuesday night we had orzo pasta with corn and the remainder of last week's mushroom sauce all tossed together. I heart orzo. Ooh, and we had a delicious side salad. I'm not sure what's on the menu for tomorrow night.

maybe it's the garlic

i'm not exactly a true follower of the challenge. my mom was in town last week and we went out to eat a bunch. jayson is taking me out for dinner tomorrow night. but, we still eat at home a lot. so, i'm blogging about it anyways.

tonight i made anny's green beans and sorta followed her ground pork "recipe." I didn't actually have any ground pork, so i cut up some pork chops into little pieces and stir fried them in a little olive/sesame oil, added the garlic and finished it off with some soy sauce. we ate all of it with some white rice. man, it was good. juju couldn't get enough of the green beans! i had to hide rice and pork behind a bean! we will certainly be making this again.

the plan for the rest of the week involves this:
tuesday: um, out
wednesday: mexi (some beans, veggies and maybe meat wrapped in a tortilla - quesadilla style for juju)
thursday: anny's butternut squash soup probably just with some bread
friday: smothered pork roast (hmm, i must of ordered a lot of pork from thundering hoooves) and kale
saturday: spinach quiche, tomato and zucchini salad

for lunches we will have hummus, tuna salad, left overs, sandwiches, quesadillas...

anyways, this week shouldn't be too hard. we'll see how it goes.

The Hunts - Day 7

We've made it through our first week! Yippie! Tonight's dinner was a creamy mushroom & yellow squash pasta with roasted chioggia beets on the side. YUM!

What helped the mushroom sauce was the mushroom "liquor". What is that??? A term I learned in culinary school, it's basically the liquid you get from reconstituting dried mushrooms. I took that liquid and reduced it by half to intensify the mushroom flavor. I then took one pint of heavy whipping cream and reduced it (I believe) by half. Once both liquids were cooled, I combined them. I actually did this a couple days in advance. To finish the sauce, I sauteed mushrooms with garlic, added a little splash of marsala wine, then added the mushroom cream & seasoned with salt & pepper.

For the pasta, I sauteed diced yellow squash and tossed it with cooked whole wheat pasta & the mushroom sauce. Finish with chopped parsley & grated parmesan cheese.

For the roasted beets, I just cut them into 1/2" dice and tossed them with diced shallots, sliced scallions, extra virgin olive oil, banyuls vinegar, sea salt & pepper.

The Hunts - Day 6 - Skillet!

Skillet is in our neighborhood tonight. They're setting up shop from 4:30pm til they "run out." David and I have yet to try any of their stuff. We had decided that IF I can make us a decent lunch, not ham sandwiches or cheese quesadillas, but something I would make for dinner, then we should be able to walk over to the Skillet truck and buy ourselves something to bring home and enjoy. We had tickets to Seattle Symphony's Tiny Tots this morning, and didn't know if we'd make it home in time for me to make lunch. I was planning on making chili. We said that if I could get it made and on the table, then we'd have Skillet. If I couldn't, then we would miss out on Skillet and wait for another oppportunity.

Delicious, hot chili made it to the table today at 12:05pm! Doh! I forgot to put the corn bread in the oven in time! But, we had it with saltines, and the corn bread was done soon after, which we all enjoyed as an afternoon snack.

I'm going to walk over to Skillet in about 15 minutes and place our order! Looking forward to it.

As for the chili, I feel like everyone has some version they like. I won't post a recipe. My chili is never the same each time. Today's was quite exciting, as it ended up being sort of a "kitchen sink" chili. Things I added include one turnip, a cup of homemade apple sauce, and a bit of jarred salsa. Gosh, just those three things together sound pretty awful. But, when it's cooked with 2 pounds of ground beef, some herbs, some spices, garlic, carrots, onions, celery, fresh tomatoes, beans, and a whole lot of love, it's actually quite yummy.

The Hunts - Day 5

Vegetarian tonight. I suppose last night was, too. Tomato soup, steamed broccoli, roasted sweet potatoes, lentils, and leftover half an Essential Bakery grilled cheese sandwich from lunch. Oh, and a tiny bit of soup from lunch for Vincent.

The lentils were from what I made for Vincent on Monday night. I added a 1/4 cup to the soup leftover from lunch for him. David also had about a 1/2 cup of lentils with his dinner. For David's, I tossed with a little extra virgin olive oil, sherry vinegar, salt and pepper.

Roasted sweet potatoes - first, I have to thank my friend, Lucy, for this. I would not have thought to make sweet potatoes like this if she hadn't made them for us last Thanksgiving. Both my guys love them this way. We ate the whole pan full!

sweet potatoes (as many as you desire), peeled and cut into 1/2" cubes
garlic, chopped
rosemary sprigs
olive oil
salt & pepper

Toss all the ingredients together, and lay them in a baking dish. Cook covered in a 425 degree F oven for about 25-30 minutes, or until tender. Uncover and continue to cook for another 10 minutes to get some color and crispiness around the edges.

The Hunts - Day 4

Not the most exciting of meals, but David and I were watching our friends' 4 year old at their house for the evening. I decided to bring over something easy. We had cheese tortellini with a jarred red sauce. That was all! But, we did eat in, and I did tell myself that I'm allowed to do stuff like this. If we had eaten it at home, I probably would've made a vegetable dish on the side. I guess I could've done that there as well, but I just wanted to make things as simple as possible. And, HEY! the kids ate the food!

The Hunts - Day 3

More brown rice tonight...

Growing up, we always had a batch of white rice in the rice cooker pretty much at all times. It was like my mom had that thing going all day long. I'm sure she didn't, but she always had hot rice available for us. I want to do that for my family one day, but I have a sucky rice cooker and the nice ones are very spendy. So, I am finding myself making a small batch daily...even though we didn't finish the stuff from last night. There just wasn't quite enough leftover for dinner again tonight. Hey, at least I get to turn it into fried rice at some point this week!

On top of the rice, we had ground pork cooked with garlic, soy sauce, and sesame oil. On the side was green beans, tossed with rice wine vinegar and sesame oil. Pretty simple dinner. A bit on the oily side, but everyone enjoyed it. Vincent actually ate more green beans tonight than he ever has. I don't know if it was the texture, the flavor, or what. I'm not going to question him.

The ground pork is so simple. Heat the sesame oil in a pan, being careful not to let it get too hot as sesame oil has a low smoke point. Add two large cloves of garlic cut into large chunks. Add 1 pound of ground pork to the pan and let it brown a little while breaking it up. Once the meat is browned, add about 1/2 cup of soy sauce (or to your taste) and about a 1/2 cup of water. Bring to a gentle boil, lower heat to a simmer, and cover. You can cook this for a while, but pretty much as soon as the meat is fully cooked, you're done.

For the green beans, follow this link: http://ourfamilymeal.blogspot.com/2008/09/wild-mushroom-risotto-and-sesame-green.html

The Hunts - Day 2

Leftovers! Yup, we ate the last of the 2 large slices of Hot Mamas pizza that we ordered on Sunday night, pre-challenge. Then, I took some of the leftover QFC roasted chicken, also bought on Sunday, and made "burritos" or "wraps" - whatever you want to call them. Not quit a burrito cuz there was nothing Mexican about it, unless you count the Kraft "Mexican" cheese mix, so maybe it's called a wrap? There was also a bit of the butternut squash soup leftover from last night that David and Vincent shared. Vincent also ate some more lentils.

All-in-all, dinner went well. Everything was eaten, save a few scraps and such on Vincent's tray.

For the wraps, I warmed 3 whole wheat flour tortillas, just to soften them. Then, I spread about a tablespoon of hummus on the tortillas, topped with some shredded chicken, cheese, and brown rice, and rolled them all up. I popped them in the oven to warm for about 10 minutes or so. I was pleasantly surprised with how these turned out!

Part of my reason for this challenge is to see how this will impact our finances. Yes, we had ordered out a few nights ago. But, the fact that we didn't let that food go to waste is huge! I still feel pretty good about how things are going...I know, it's only Day 2.

The Hunts, Day 1 - We're Back, and We're Ready!

Um, I think...
I was planning on starting our 30 days on Wednesday, so that I could have today and tomorrow to plan for the week. But, I went to the store today with a list of necessities but no plans, and actually sat down to put my thoughts on paper when I got home. I decided to look at my receipts and see how many dishes I can come up with based on my purchases, and then figure out if I have enough to get us through the week. Here's what I came up with:

-butternut squash soup
-bakes sweet potatoes
-broccoli
-tomato soup
-ground pork with soy sauce and garlic
-green beans with sesame oil & rice wine vinegar
-tortellini pasta with mushrooms
-chili & corn bread
-chicken burritos or wraps (Am I allowed to use my store bought QFC roasted chicken if it's a leftover from before the challenge began?)

I figured I had about 5 main dishes, and would most likely have leftovers. It's a good start. So, I decided to start my 30 days today!

For dinner tonight, we had butternut squash soup with cherry pumpernickle croutons & bacon bits. I also made a batch of lentils for Vincent. I love lentils, but they do a major number on my stomach. David had an upset stomach today, so he skipped them as well. But, the soup was really super yummy! Everyone ate it happily, and Vincent even ate all the lentils.

Here's what I did:
1 cup chopped onions
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup chopped carrots
1 each large garlic clove, minced
1/2 cup white wine
1 each medium sized butternut squash, halved, seeded and roasted (350 degree F, 45 minutes - 1 hour)
2 cups Tall Grass Bakery cherry pumpernickle bread, cut into 1/2" cubes, without crust
1 cup thick bacon, cut into 1/4" pieces

-Sweat the onions, celery, carrots and garlic in a pan with olive oil & a pinch of salt, over medium heat. When the onions have turned translucent, add the wine. Turn up the heat and reduce most of the wine. Cover the vegetables with water, bring to a boil, then simmer until vegetables are tender.
-Scoop out the meat of the squash and add to the soup. Add any extra water as needed & bring to a boil again.
-Puree the soup, adding more water if needed. Season with salt and pepper.
-For the croutons, toss in olive oil, salt & pepper. Bake at 350 degree F for about 15 minutes, or until bread is dried and hardened.
-For the bacon bits, render the bacon in a pan at medium heat until crispy. Strain off the fat & set the bacon bits aside.
-To serve the soup, spoon into bowls and garnish with the croutons and bacon bits.