Week 19 - Fall Colors

[Posted by Ruth]
It's been a classic Fall in New England kind of weekend; crisp air, patches of dark clouds scudding across bright blue sky, leaves swirling on the deck.  It gave me the urge to put things by, to clean out drawers, to make soup, to capture this short season before the next one closes in.  First, there was a lot of blanching and freezing to do.  Corn, green beans and pureed eggplant all packaged and frozen.  Then, a roasted fall vegetable soup.

Roasted Autumn Vegetable Soup


 For the roasted Vegetables:
3 Turnips - peeled and cut into 1" cubes
1 Small butternut squash - peeled and cut into 1" cubes
1 Bunch baby carrots - washed, scraped and the larger ones cut into 1/2 or 1/3s
1 T Olive oil
1 T Maple syrup - grade B for best flavor
Salt

Preheat oven to 350.  Toss vegetables with salt, olive oil and maple syrup in a shallow baking dish and bake for approximately 1 1/2 hours, turning occasionally, until vegetables are quite soft and a bit caramelized. 

Remove from oven and set aside.

For the soup:
Roasted vegetables from above
1/2 medium onion, finely chopped
1 T butter
5 sprigs of fresh thyme, leaves only
2-4 cups water (add more or less, depending on desired consistency) 
Salt, Pepper to taste
1 T Maple syrup
4-6 dashes Tabasco Sauce

In heavy soup pot over low/medium heat, cook onion and thyme leaves in melted butter until onions are translucent and quite soft and thyme is fragrant.  Don't brown.  Turn off heat.  Add vegetables and 1 cup or more of the water and begin to puree with an immersion blender.  ( place in food processor or blender at this point)  Blend, adding water as needed until you have a smooth, thick soup.  Add maple syrup, Tabasco sauce and salt and pepper to taste and heat over low/medium heat until heated through, taking care to not let it stick.  Serve with more fresh thyme, kale chips, croutons or crusty bread.  Makes about 8 cups.

We're reaching the end of the regular CSA and I'm definitely going to miss it.  Right now, we are getting terrific variety and quantity.  In a few weeks we'll switch over to the somewhat smaller Fall CSA which will take us into December.  After that it will be a bit of a free swim at Tale of Two Farm Shares.  We'll look for ways to creatively use what's in the freezer and pantry from the CSA, try to continue to buy local and cook some other things just for fun.  Hope you'll stay with us.