I walked out to the garden to check on my butternut squash and as I entered my garden I smelled fresh thyme. I love that my herbs are right next to my gate and I could smell them all day long. I picked a butternut squash and grabbed some of that thyme I smelled and went back to the house. There sits my table filled with apples from our recent trip to the apple orchard and that was my inspiration for creating this dish. It makes a great vegetarian/ vegan main dish and would also make a great side dish. It plated up so pretty as well that it would be great for entertaining and I think I will make it to bring to Thanksgiving dinner.
Roasted Butternut Squash Medley
Makes 4 main dish servings or 6-8 side dish servings
1 butternut squash, approx 3lb
1 c wild rice, brown rice, or rice of choice (used half cracked wild rice and half brown rice)
1 large apple (used a sweeter apple)
1/2 red onion, sliced, approx 3/8″ slices
1 TBSP extra virgin olive oil
sea salt and fresh ground pepper, to taste
few spring of fresh thyme, or rosemary could also be used
Peel the butternut squash, being careful as the squash will get slippery. Cut the squash in half length-wise from the steam down. Remove seeds and clean out the inside. Cut squash right above the bulbous, larger round, end and save or you can also cut that up if you would like I didn’t this time. Now with the two narrower long sections, mine measured about 5″ long, cut those in quarters length-wise. If you have any of the peel left on the outside you can remove it with a paring knife at this point. Slice each section into cubes, I think I got 7 or 8 pieces out of each section. Preheat oven to 425. Start cooking rice according to the package and rice you have. Toss squash with the oil and spread on a lined baking sheet and season with sea salt and fresh ground pepper. You can also spray your sheet with coconut oil if you wish. When oven is up to temp put the squash in and bake for 15 minutes. In the meantime slice onion if you haven’t already done so. Peel and core the apple and slice, I sliced mine into 24 slices. After the squash has baked for 15 minutes flip/ toss the squash so it browns evenly. Add the apples and separated onion slices to the squash and continue to bake for 15-20 minutes until squash and apples are tender. If they are done and you would like them a little more roasted you can broil them a couple of minutes, watching closely. Remove vegetables from the oven. Plate rice, or rice mixtures, top with the roasted vegetables, and sprinkle with fresh thyme. Enjoy!
