Thursday, October 1, 2009

Buttercup Squash/Kabocha

Sorry for the lack of posts! I have a friend visiting and it's been hard to juggle entertainment, schoolwork, a jobhunt, and updates all at once.

My grocery store started carrying tons of squash for Fall and one was labeled as Buttercup Squash. I did some reading and it is the closest cousin to kabocha. The two taste ridiculously similar, and are suggested to be substitutes for one another if necessary. I'm not 100% sure what mine was, because it looks so similar to the kabocha pics I've seen on everybody's blogs. I'm also not fully secure in my local store's knowledge to label it properly.

The queen of kabocha, Maggie, suggested I roast it. I love roasted anything, so I promptly followed her advice.

Johnny helped me cut it in half, because holy smokes was this unwieldy! Then I scooped out the seeds. The inside smelled sweet, almost like a ripe cantaloupe!

The skin had a waxy film on it, so we chose to peel the outside. Then I cut it into 1/4" slices, tossed with olive oil and sprinkled with salt and pepper. They went into a 425° oven for about 25-30 minutes, flipping once.

Served alongside thin sliced chicken breasts, browned in a little bit of olive oil, with salt, pepper, garlic and onion powders. Also roasted radishes (ehhh) and roasted zucchini.

It was surprisingly great. I love squash, and cook with it semi-regularly, but this was a whole new level of good. I couldn't stop eating it! It's my new favorite!

8 comments:

LizNoVeggieGirl said...

No worries!! Friends/life come before blogging :)


I have yet to try kabocha OR buttercup squash - can't find either here at the markets :( Looks delicious!!

Anonymous said...

OMG YES!!!!!!!!!!

I'm so glad you liked it. You won't be able to stop eating it :)

Maggie said...

Darnit, why did that make me "anonymous". Grrr stupid google.

Anonymous said...

Kabocha is only like..my favorite favorite veggie/carb/melon/squash whatever in the world!!!! Ok, maybe butternut squash a close one, but kabocha is definitely delicious steamed as well!! Try it!! no condiments required and you can eat it like it's a dessert. :) gosh i'm salivating already...though your "fries" look amazing too!

Laura said...

I think most winter squash taste very similar...that being said kabocha soup was fantastic while butter nut was soso. I LOVE SQUASH!!

Nowheymama said...

I love squash! I wish the rest of my family did.

Anonymous said...

As soon as I saw that I was going to say "go to Maggie's site for ideas!"

I still haven't found it by me, but I haven't looked too hard either. I still have two acorn squashes to cook up this weekend too.

Happy Friday!

c said...

Once again, I can also concur that this meal was fan-freaking-tastic (although mine was cooked ever-so-slightly differently from Christina's because I've crossed many things off my eating regimen...until about day two of my visit :-p freakin' delicious White Castle...)!!! FYI, luckytastebuds, steaming veggies unfortunately removes almost ALL of the phytonutrients and other good-for-you things that make them not only delish BUT nutrish (very upsetting as I love my steamer) so probably not a good idea to do so often if you really wanna get the most vitamin/mineral bang for your buck. The taste is the same, however.