White bean and squash soup

There are only a few weeks left in our farm share. I'm sad that our diet (and carbon footprint) is going to take a turn for the worse.

For these last couple bountiful weeks we've made soups as a way to use the veggies. Here's how I made a white bean and winter squash soup with sage and kale. This was easy, turned out great and made an excellent meal for a couple lunches and dinners. We had trouble getting a good up-close photo, as the soup always appears blurry and kind of gross. I think you get the idea here.

This was an easy soup to make and I adapted a recipe from Alice Waters' The Art of Simple Food. I love this cookbook.

The recipe calls for 1 medium butternut squash, but I used three small mystery squash from the share. I think one might've been acorn. They all had yellow-orange flesh. I also added the kale to the recipe, using a beautiful red one from the share.

winter squash, about the equivalent of 1 medium butternut squash, peeled and diced into 1/2 inch cubes

2 cans cannellini beans

3 cups vegetable broth, 4 cups water

2 TBS olive oil

2 onions, thinly sliced

3 or 4 sage leaves

1 bay leaf

1 bunch of kale, rinsed and chopped into bite-sized pieces

salt, fresh pepper

Waters' recipe calls for fresh beans cooked in a broth which is then used in the soup. Instead, I heated the canned beans (after rinsing) for about 5 minutes, in vegetable broth and water and saved this liquid. This time instead of using a carton of broth I used a sea salt and herb bouillion cube, which added great flavor.

In a soup pot, heat the sliced onions in the olive oil, along with the sage leaves and bay leaf. Cook the onions for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until they're tender. Then stir in the squash and salt to taste. Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring a bit.

Next drain the warmed-up beans and save the cooking liquid. Add 6 cups of the liquid to the squash and onion mix. Simmer until the squash gets tender, about 15-20 minutes.

For the last few minutes of cooking stir in the beans and kale. Add more salt if necessary and fresh ground pepper to taste. Enjoy with a slice of hearty bread with butter.