As we have said before, anything green, when it comes to food is suspect. We are not exactly sure how we feel about orange, but to appease our Mom’s goal to eat more vegetables, we decided to experiment with butternut squash soup.
Is Baby Food Actually Butternut Squash Soup?
As I was cooking, I remembered something funny about my baby pictures. I always seemed to have an odd, orange tint to my skin. What was wrong with me?
“Squash and sweet potatoes were the only vegetable baby food you would eat and I thought I would stuff you full of something healthy while I had the chance.”
Mom
Listen, have you smelled green baby food? Are they trying to turn kids off vegetables for the rest of their lives? I don’t blame my younger self one tiny little bit.
The sad truth is that my mom continued to buy baby food for us for a very long time. We fell prey to the individual serving cups that companies schemed up, and would eat them just because they came in their own little container. Plus, you did not have to chew the vegetables. I think this is key for kids to do not like the texture of plants in their mouths.
The Worst Part of Making Soup
For sure the worst part of making soup is all of the cutting preparations. But cutting a butternut squash? It is like chopping wood on your counter! We have watched Mom break a sweat and almost a knife in the process and we were not interested. Luckily, we found cubed squash in a bag at the grocery store and it wasn’t that much more expensive than buying one whole!
After everything else was prepared, we sauteed the onions, celery, and carrots for a bit. Pro tip: If you are feeding this Butternut Squash soup to kids who do not like vegetables, don’t show them this step. They will refuse to eat it based on principle.
How Thick to Make the Soup?
The thing about most of the Butternut Squash Soups that we have tried in the past is that they are very thin, hence the name soup. However, this makes it very difficult to dip your grilled cheese sandwich into the bowl and eat it without a spoon.
Our goal for this recipe was to try to make it more like the baby food that we ate in large quantities when we were little. We have dabbled in some potato soup recipes in the past and decided that we would triple the amount of potatoes to see if it would give us the right texture.
After allowing the soup to simmer for 30 minutes, we pulled out the immersion blender and slowly watched this turn into the baby food of our dreams. I would suggest leaving the tip IN the soup while blending, to avoid an angry Mother due to orange splats of food everywhere.
The recipe calls for brown sugar at the end, and guess what? We used it ALL in our brown sugar cookie experiment. But to be honest? We never missed it. Maybe we overdosed from eating too many cookies.
Butternut Squash Soup for Kids
How to Get Kids to Eat Vegetables with Butternut Squash Soup
Ingredients
- 1 Tablespoon Butter
- 1/2 Tablespoon Olive Oil
- 2 Stalks Celery, Diced
- 1/2 Cup Sliced Carrots
- 1 Cup Cut Onion
- 4 Large Garlic Cloves Minced
- 3 Medium Potatoes, Peeled and Diced (About 3 Cups)
- 1 16 Ounce Bag of Cubed Butternut Squash
- 32 Ounces Chicken Broth
- 1 1/2 Teaspoon Salt
Optional
- 1 Pinch Red Pepper
- 1 Tablespoon Brown Sugar
- Sour Cream
Instructions
- In a large stock pot, heat olive oil and butter. When butter is melted add onions, carrots, celery, and garlic.
Saute for 2-3 minutes or until onion is tender. - Add the squash, potato, salt, red pepper (if using), and chicken broth. Bring to a boil and then turn down to a simmer.
- Simmer with the lid on for 30-40 minutes. Check pieces of squash, celery, and potato to make sure they are fork-tender. Stir in brown sugar if using.
- Use an immersion blender, or transfer soup to a regular blender and puree until smooth.