Barefoot Contessa Pumpkin Soup Food

WINTER SQUASH SOUP

Steps:

• Heat the butter and oil in a heavy - bottomed stockpot, add the onions, and cook over medium - low heat for 10 minutes, or until translucent. Add the pumpkin puree, butternut squash, chicken stock, salt, and pepper. Cover and simmer over medium - low heat for about 20 minutes, until the butternut squash is very tender. Process the mixture through the medium blade of a food mill. Return to the pot, add the half - and - half, and heat slowly. If the soup needs more flavor, add another teaspoon of salt. Serve hot with garnishes, if desired.
• Cook's Note: To serve with croutons, remove the crusts from 2 slices of white bread, cut them in 1/2-inch cubes, and saute them in 1 tablespoon of butter until browned. Season with salt and pepper.

"PUMPKIN" SOUP

Steps:

• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
• Place the squash halves on 2 sheet pans cut-side up. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle generously with salt. Roast until fork-tender, about 20 minutes. Set aside until cool enough to handle.
• Meanwhile, add the potatoes to a pot of heavily salted water. Bring to a boil and cook until fork-tender, about 15 minutes. Drain and set aside.
• Add olive oil to coat the bottom of a heavy-bottomed stockpot over medium-high heat. When the oil starts to shimmer, add the leeks and saute until wilted, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and red pepper flakes and cook until translucent, another 2 minutes. Add the celery and a big pinch of salt and saute until soft, about 5 minutes more. Add the potatoes and fold to combine. Add the white wine and vegetable stock and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook until the flavors have melded and vegetables are soft, about 10 minutes.
• Scoop out the flesh of the squash and add to the pot. Using an immersion blender, blend until smooth. Add the cream and blend once more until velvety. Taste and adjust the seasoning. Serve with toasted pepitas, a drizzle of pumpkin seed oil and goat cheese crumbles. Enjoy!

PUMPKIN SOUP SERVED IN INDIVIDUAL ROASTED PUMPKINS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Prepare the small pumpkins as though you were making jackolanterns, cutting off and reserving top, scooping out seeds and reserving, but stopping short of carving the face. Set aside. Repeat preparation with the medium pumpkin, then cut it into wedges along its natural grooves. Peel each wedge with a sharp swivel peeler. Cut flesh into 2-inch chunks and set aside.
• In a small bowl combine ground spices with 1/2 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Sprinkle this mixture into pumpkin cavities, dividing evenly. Cut 1 tablespoon butter into bits and divide between pumpkins. Replace pumpkin tops and place pumpkins in a shallow roasting pan. Roast 30 to 40 minutes until tender when pierced with a knife but still intact. Remove from oven and set aside.
• While pumpkins are roasting, prepare the soup: Heat remaining butter along with olive oil over mediumhigh heat in large pot or Dutch oven until foamy. Add onions and remaining salt and pepper and cook 5 minutes until softened and begin to color. Add garlic and cook 1 minute to release flavor. Add diced potato, chunked pumpkin flesh and stock and bring to a simmer. Reduce heat and simmer 30 minutes until potatoes and pumpkin are completely soft. Pass soup through a food mill fitted with the fine blade into a clean pot. Whisk in cream, taste and adjust seasoning and set aside.
• Roasted pumpkins and soup should be done at about the same time. To serve, remove tops from pumpkins and use a melon baller to scoop balls of pumpkin flesh, leaving them in their respective pumpkins. Carefully ladle soup into each pumpkin, filling about 2/3 full. Replace pumpkin tops, place each pumpkin on a plate, and serve.

PUMPKIN SOUP

Steps:

• In a stockpot over medium heat, melt butter and saute onion, carrot, apple, roasted pumpkin, and sage until all are tender, about 8 to 10 minutes. Puree the mixture in a food mill; if you do not have a food mill, then puree in a food processor or blender. Return the puree to the stockpot, add the chicken stock and simmer for 15 minutes. Then add the cream and simmer for 5 more minutes, lowering the heat if necessary so it does not boil. Season, to taste, with salt and pepper.
• Divide soup among 4 soup bowls and serve immediately.

LENTIL VEGETABLE SOUP (BAREFOOT CONTESSA)

Steps:

• In a large bowl, cover the lentils with boiling water and allow to sit for 15 minutes. Drain.
• In a large stockpot on medium heat, saute the onions, leeks, and garlic with the olive oil, salt, pepper, thyme, and cumin for 20 minutes, until the vegetables are translucent and very tender. Add the celery and carrots and saute for 10 more minutes. Add the chicken stock, tomato paste, and lentils. Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer uncovered for 1 hour, until the lentils are cooked through. Check the seasonings. Add the red wine and serve hot, drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with grated Parmesan.

KABOCHA PUMPKIN SOUP

Steps:

• Place kabocha squash cut-side down into a microwave-safe baking dish. Pour 1/2 inch water around the squash. Microwave on high until tender, about 10 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes.
• Heat olive oil in a small skillet over medium heat. Cook and stir onion and garlic until onion is translucent, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a blender.
• Scoop kabocha squash flesh into the blender. Add pumpkin puree, vegetable broth, cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice. Blend until smooth.
• Pour blended mixture into a saucepan. Cook and stir over medium-low heat until heated through, 5 to 10 minutes.

PUMPKIN MUSHROOM SOUP

Steps:

• Sautée the onions and mushrooms in the butter until soft.
• Sprinkle on the flour and stir.
• Add the honey,salt, pepper, curry and nutmeg.
• Gradually stir in broth and pumpkin. Simmer for 25-35 minutes.
• Stir in the cream and heat through, don't boil.
• Taste and reseason!
• Garnish with sourcream and parsley.

BAREFOOT CONTESSA PUMPKIN MOUSSE - INA GARTEN

Steps:

• Heat the half-and-half, pumpkin puree, brown sugar, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg in a heat-proof bowl set over a pan of simmering water until hot, about 5 minutes.
• Whisk the egg yolks in another bowl, stir some of the hot pumpkin into the egg yolks to heat them. Pour the egg-pumpkin mixture slowly back into the double boiler and stir well.
• Heat the mixture again over the simmering water for another 4-5 minutes, until it begins to thicken (about 140 degrees), stirring CONSTANTLY. You don't want the eggs to scramble. Remove from heat.
• Dissolve the gelatin in 1/2 cup cold water. Add the dissolved gelatin, bananas and orange zest to the pumpkin mixture and mix well. Set aside to cool.
• Whip the heavy cream (chilled very cold) in the bowl of an electric mixer with a whisk attachment until soft peaks form. Add the sugar and continue to whisk until you have firm peaks. Carefully fold the whipped cream into the cooled pumpkin mixture and pout it into a 7 inch x 2-3/4 inch round souffle dish.
• Chill for 2 hours or overnight.
• For the decoration: Whip last 1 cup of cold heavy cream until soft peaks form. Add the sugar and vanilla and continue to whisk until you have firm peaks. Pipe or spoon the whipped cream decoratively on the mousse and sprinkle, if desired, with remaining orange zest.
• Serve chilled.
• [As always with zest, be sure to just get the orange skin and not any of the white pith, which is bitter -- the orange in this enhances the flavors so that it is very refreshing - I could NOT believe how good this was - and how satisfying a small portion was!].

PUMPKIN-PEAR SOUP

Steps:

• Sauté the pear and onion in butter over medium heat.
• Stir constantly until the onions are translucent.
• You also want the pears tender.
• Blend pear mixture and pumpkin in a food processor until smooth.
• Transfer to a large saucepan where you will add the broth, water, wine, cinnamon, salt.
• Bring to a boil.
• Reduce to simmer for 20 minutes uncovered.
• Remove cinnamon stick and stir in the cream.
• Heat thoroughly, but do not boil.
• You may garnish with a dab of sour cream topped with thin strips of green onion.

BAREFOOT CONTESSA'S ROSEMARY WHITE BEAN SOUP

Steps:

• In a medium bowl, cover the beans with water by at least 1 inch and leave them in the refrigerator for 6 hours or overnight. Drain.
• In a large stockpot over low to medium heat, saute the onions with the olive oil until the onions are translucent, 10 to 15 minutes.
• Add the garlic and cook over low heat for 3 more minutes.
• Add the drained white beans, rosemary, chicken stock, and bay leaf. Cover, bring to a boil, and simmer for 30 to 40 minutes, until the beans are very soft.
• Remove the rosemary branch and the bay leaf. Pass the soup through the coarsest blade of a food mill, or place in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a steel blade and pulse until coarsely pureed.
• Return the soup to the pot to reheat and add salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot.

MISO-TAHINI SQUASH SOUP WITH BROWN RICE

Steps:

• Mix rice, 1 Tbsp. coconut oil, a pinch of salt, and 5 cups water in a medium heavy saucepan. Cover and bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer until rice is al dente, about 25 minutes. Drain; set aside.
• Meanwhile, heat remaining 1 Tbsp. coconut oil in a large pot over medium. Add ginger and garlic and cook, stirring occasionally, until fragrant and just starting to brown, about 1 minute. Add broth, scraping the bottom of the pot with a wooden spoon to release garlic mixture, and bring to a simmer. Add squash and simmer 8 minutes. Add kale and cook, stirring, until vegetables are cooked through, 3-5 minutes.
• Whisk miso, tahini, sesame oil, and 1 tsp. salt in a medium bowl. Add 1/2 cup hot water and whisk until very smooth. When vegetables are cooked through, remove pot from heat and gently stir in tahini mixture (overheating tahini will cause it to separate). Season to taste, then immediately divide among bowls with brown rice. Top with scallions, sesame seeds, nori, and chili oil.
• Do Ahead
• Soup can be made 2 days ahead; chill in a resealable container. Reheat gently over low to avoid tahini from separating.