#once u have a jar of salt u can just open it and drop whatever you need inside it

[witch--tips]

🫙 WITCH TIP 🧂

Filling a big old jar with salt gives you a good place to put things to cleanse whenever you need

[bloodenjoyer]

butternut squash soup

recipe (more like a diary entry of how i made it lol) under the cut!! also warning this is not a quick recipe i started this whole process at like 2:30 and didnt finish the soup until abt 5:45 ish, didnt pull the bread out of the oven until abt 6:30. it was so worth it tho

Ok so basically i decided i wanted to make bread and butternut squash soup for dinner so i started by making the bread and followed this recipe. then while the dough was rising i started tackling the squash. i used a ~4.5 pound squash and started by cutting it in half and putting it in a bowl of water in the microwave for...idk six minutes each half? a bit more? just to make it softer. then i scraped out the guts and seeds (annoying and icky) and cut it into smaller pieces and peeled it with a carrot peeler. this takes a bit more effort than peeling carrots because the squash is hot and soft but also hard and weird and the skin is kinda thick. As i peeled each segment i cut them into smaller pieces and dropped them into a large pot on the stove to just kinda hang out on medium heat in a can of chicken stock, stirring each time i added more squash. i probs shouldve used vegetable broth but chicken stock is what i had so thats what i used.

once i added all of the squash (compost the skin btw!! i forgot to do that :/ ) into the pot, i squeezed a whole lemon into it. then i added like maybe five cloves of garlic cut into large pieces as well as some honey, cinnamon, cumin, lawrys seasoned salt, smoked paprika, lots of garlic powder and some cayenne pepper. stirred it again and then popped the lid on while i cut up two small onions. once i was done w the onions i rinsed out the bowl i originally microwaved them in and transferred the squash back into it.

i then put olive oil and a tiny bit of sesame oil (idk why) into the pan and let the onions fry up. to this i added: more cumin (fav spice ever <3), turmeric, herbs du provence (not sure what these are there just was a jar on the counter so i used it), and i also grated ginger into it. be careful not to let yr onions burn btw. Then once they looked like they had cooked down enough to fit into the bowl w the squash i put them in the bowl w the rest of the squash.

Next i made a béchamel sauce w coconut milk. i heated a can of coconut milk (obvs not the ACTUAL can i put it in a measuring cup and it came out to b abt 1 and 1/4 cups) in the microwave so it would be hot. then i put 2tablespoons of butter and 2tablespoons of flour in the pan. you gotta stir this constantly (its easiest if you use a whisk) so U dont accidentally make dumplings. once that starts getting thick and bubbling a little bit i added the coconut milk in increments, still whisking it the whole time. once that was done i lowered the heat so it wouldnt get curdled or dumplingy and added white pepper, sriracha sauce (first thing i saw when i opened the cabinet so i added it), more garlic powder and cumin bc i like those things a lot.

so then i finally added all the squash and onions back into the pot. i mixed it all in and then blended it w/ a handheld blender. if u dont have one u can just do all the squash ina food processor before adding it back to the pot and if you dont . Um try your luck with a potato masher i guess. EXCEPT i got scared while blending it on account of my pot was so wide and that meant the soup was just a BIT shallow. so i squoze a lime into it. that obviously wasn't enough and i added a bit more milk (cow milk, not coconut milk bc i didnt wanna open a whole nother can and i figured i had already put butter in it so who cares) and then blended it until it was smooth as i could make it. the blender pretty much made all the squash smooth but there were still unblended onions which personally i actually like.

then i finally tried it and it was soo fucking good oh my god.itwas so so worth it. i didnt use a recipe for this when i cook i just throw whatever into a pan and hope for the best but im writing it down bc i wanna make this again bc it was.very yummy.

anyway then i put a lid on the pot and let it hang out while i preheated the oven and baked the bread (which i also painted the crust w an eggwash and put a bit of salt on before sticking it in the oven) etc etc etc .