Happy New Year Everyone! I am starting 2017 with one of my favorite dishes I made last year – Roasted Acorn Squash! It is a pain to cut this squash but the overall outcome is just delicious. This is by no means a “healthy” recipe but I still love it! So let’s get started.
Here is what you will need:
- 1 large acorn squash
- 4 tablespoons of melted butter
- Few branches of rosemary
- 3 tablespoons of maple syrup
- 3 tablespoon of cooking wine or any wine
- (X) pieces of bacon – chopped . X because it’s bacon. Go crazy if you want!
- Sea salt and fresh ground black pepper for seasoning
Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees.
Slice acorn into thin 1/2 to 1 inch slices. Mix acorn slices with melted butter and bake in oven until soft and tender. I baked for good 20 to 25 minutes.
While the acorns are cooking in oven, in a cooking pan, sauté bacon pieces . Remove just the bacon bits once they are crisp and brown. Set aside the bacon pieces on a paper towel. Leave the extra drippings from the bacon in the pan and slowly add rosemary, wine and maple syrup. Be careful when you do this as the hot drippings may spatter and cause blisters on skin. I usually wear oven mitts and pour wine and maple syrup from the side. Cook the mixture for few minutes.
Add the bacon pieces, the maple syrup – wine mixture, salt and pepper to cooked acorn slices. Mix gently as acorn slices may be too soft and might break. Finally garnish it with the sautéed rosemary!
Modification: I have made this dish couple of times and changed it few times based on the dietary restrictions of my guests. If you want to make this completely vegetarian, skip the bacon. Use olive oil to sauté the rosemary instead of bacon drippings. If you want to skip the wine, use white wine vinegar instead.
Hope you enjoy the dish as much I do.
