Roasted Butternut Squash – With Embellishments!
Back when we first began staying at home, I decided we ought to buy some produce that would last a long time, and so I brought home a whole butternut squash. We’ve still been able to get out to the stores, albeit rather infrequently, and get perishable vegetables, so the butternut squash has been sitting there on the counter for weeks. I also found that I had a few tablespoons at the bottom of a jar of tahini and a single preserved lemon remaining in an open jar in the fridge. It was time to use things up!
I knew I had seen winter squash with tahini before, so off to my account at Eat Your Books I went. There are several from which I took some inspiration, but mostly from a recipe for roasted squash in Yotam Ottolenghi’s Jerusalem. Roasting is pretty much my favorite method of cooking vegetables – I swear when my kids were young I made roasted cauliflower at least once a week if not more often.
There were a number of ingredients from Ottolenghi’s recipe I omitted, and I used the preserved lemon just because I wanted to finish up the jar in the fridge, instead of the regular lemon he calls for. But I liked his idea of adding onions and za’atar. I ended up with the concoction below. If you don’t have preserved lemon, by all means use some fresh lemon juice, but not the rind as it would be too chewy. Also, the preserved lemons I had are quite spicy, so if you are using fresh lemon juice, add some crushed red pepper flakes as the heat plays well against the creaminess of the tahini and the sweet of the squash.
Butternut Squash with Tahini, Preserved Lemon, and Za’atar
Serves 2-3
1 medium or large butternut squash or similar winter squash variety, peeled, seeded, and cut into cubes or wedges
1 medium or large onion, peeled and cut into 12-16 wedges (I like to trim just the hairs of the root to keep the nub intact so that the wedges hold together)
2-3 Tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon kosher salt
¼-½ teaspoon crushed red pepper (optional)
¼ cup tahini
1 preserved lemon or 2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1-2 Tablespoons water
2 Tablespoons za’atar
Preheat the oven to 475ºF.
Arrange the squash and onion wedges in a glass or metal roasting pan, spreading out in a single layer as much as possible. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and crushed red peppers (if using). Bake in the oven for 30 minutes, or until the edges of the onions are beginning to char and the face-down sides of the squash pieces have become brown.
Place the tahini in a small bowl. If using a preserved lemon, take one half, and squeeze the juice through a strainer into the tahini. Discard the pulp from the whole preserved lemon and cut the skin into ½-¾-inch strips. If not using preserved lemon, don’t add the rind from the lemon but rather just add the fresh lemon juice to the tahini.
When the vegetables are ready, add the water to the tahini and mix until smooth. It should be a thick liquid. Dollop the tahini mixture on the vegetables, scatter the pieces of preserved lemon skin on top (if using), sprinkle with za’atar, and serve.