Squash & Gourds
1180 recipes found
Grilled Chicken Breasts With Spicy Cucumbers
Light and refreshing, yet packed with flavor from herbs, jalapeños and garlic, this is an easy, after-work meal that can be endlessly adapted to suit what you’ve got on hand. Substitute other thinly sliced raw vegetables for the cucumbers (zucchini, carrot, radishes, celery, cabbage, fennel), and other herbs for the cilantro and parsley (dill, basil, mint). Just be sure not to overcook the flattened chicken, which can happen in an instant.
Grilled or Roasted Pattypan “Steaks” With Italian Salsa Verde
Cut into thick slices, pattypan squash, which look sort of like small flying saucers, can make a juicy sort of “steak” that could be topped by a pungent sauce. Grill or roast the “steaks” and serve them with this gorgeous green sauce. You’ll need only half the amount of salsa verde that this recipe yields, but it keeps very well in the refrigerator and it’s great to have on hand.
Pork Satay With Thai Spices and Peanut Sauce
Throughout Southeast Asia, little skewers of marinated meat, grilled over coals, are sold as street snacks. Sweetly fragrant with coconut milk and spices, they are perfect for barbecue parties served with steamed rice, or on their own with drinks, whether grilled indoors or out. You may use pork loin or tenderloin, but marbled sirloin or shoulder is more succulent.
Pumpkin Cheesecake In Nut Crust
Some cheesecakes are the culinary equivalent of a punch in the gut: too sweet, too heavy, too filling. This one, first published in The Times in 1984, is delightfully different. It's lightly-sweet, slightly tangy and gently laced with spiced pumpkin flavor. The texture is surprisingly airy. Serve slices with a dollop of whipped cream or créme fraîche. Don't skip the part of the recipe that calls for allowing it to cool in the oven overnight; it promises a crack-free, glossy top.
Japanese-Style Beef Stew
This beef stew is loaded with the warmth of soy, ginger, sweetness (best provided by mirin, the sweet Japanese cooking wine, but sugar or honey will do, too), winter squash and the peel and juice of a lemon. These simple and delicious counterpoints make a great stew.
Roasted Chicken Thighs With Winter Squash
Roasted chicken thighs can be the juicy, meaty center of many weeknight meals. Add delicata squash, quickly tossed in a maple syrup-butter glaze, along with slices of lemon and sage, and you have a something more unusual, an interplay of flavors that don’t generally meet on the same sheet pan. This recipe is a little too fussy to count as a fast weeknight dish, but there is nothing difficult about any of the steps. And it’s a fine introduction to delicata squash, if you haven’t cooked with them yet. Unlike many other winter squash varieties, they have a thin skin and don’t need to be peeled (just cut them in half and remove the seeds), making them as easy to prepare as they are sweet.
Cucumber and Chili Raita
Salad Greens With Creamy Cucumber Dressing
Roasted Chicken Thighs With Garlicky Cucumber Yogurt
In this simple, homey weeknight dinner, boneless chicken thighs are tossed with garlic, herbs and red-pepper flakes, then roasted along with lemon wedges in the pan. As the lemons brown, their acids mellow, becoming softer and sweeter. When squeezed over the chicken for serving, they offer a rounded tang that’s complemented by dollops of cucumber-flecked yogurt and chopped fresh mint. The combination of cucumbers and yogurt is a classic across many cultures, from Indian raita to Persian mast-o khiar to Greek tzatziki and beyond. For this recipe, be sure to use thick Greek-style or other strained yogurt (such as labneh) or substitute sour cream. Thinner yogurt will make the sauce runny. Serve this over rice or with flatbread to catch the juices and the cucumber yogurt.
Curried Summer Squash Soup With Yuba and Cilantro
Crenshaw Soup
Salty-Sweet Salmon With Ginger and Spicy Cucumber Salad
This 2006 recipe came to The Times by way of David Myers, the American chef and restaurateur, when Amanda Hesser called upon him to re-interpret this 1961 Times recipe for Chinese barbecued spareribs. He kept the simple soy-garlic-ketchup (yes, ketchup) marinade intact and applied it to salmon. He then served it with a preserved ginger relish and a cucumber salad seasoned with shichimi togarashi, a fiery Japanese spice blend (red pepper flakes make a fine substitute). If you don't have the time to make the relish and cucumber salad, serve the salmon with a few slivers of preserved ginger from a jar, a pile of white rice and some sautéed greens. That's better than your standard grilled salmon by a mile.
Sea Scallops Grenobloise
Grilled-Zucchini Terrine With Niçoise Olives and Herbs
Spicy Shrimp With Blistered Cucumbers, Corn and Tomato
When warm weather arrives, the best recipes are the simple ones that allow seasonal produce to shine. In this recipe, shrimp gets a quick marinade in lime juice, ginger and garlic while the rest of the salad is assembled. Pan-searing cucumbers and corn deepens their flavor and adds a pleasant contrast to the fresh tomatoes. The Thai-style vinaigrette adds zingy brightness. Serve this salad over rice studded with mint and scallions, or as a side dish to grilled steak or pork. The shrimp and the dressing (minus the chives) can be made ahead and stored in the fridge for a day or so in advance, just be sure to bring them to room temperature before tossing everything together.
Stuffed Rond de Nice Squash Poached in Olive Oil
Cucumber Raita
Serve this raita as a refreshing side dish with grains or with any curry. Or enjoy it on its own for lunch.
Winter Squash and Sage Blini
Pancakes are a great vehicle for many vegetables. These are simple buttermilk/buckwheat blini with puréed butternut squash and sage whisked into the batter. I make them small and serve them as hors d’oeuvres. For vegetarian blini I top them with drained yogurt and a small spoonful of the sautéed winter squash with anchovies, capers and olives in this week’s recipes. You can also go the more traditional blini route and top with smoked salmon.
Risi e Bisi
The classic Venetian dish of rice and peas known as risi e bisi makes for a perfect springtime Sunday lunch. This version includes the addition of baby zucchini, which is an acknowledged departure from tradition but a mighty delicious one. The desired final consistency is loose, almost brothy, not tight and creamy like risotto nor drippy like a zuppa. The Venetians use the term “all’onda,” a reference to the swell of waves in the sea. Short-grain rice helps get that distinct starchy quality, but the rice can’t do the job by itself; there has to be stirring throughout. Pour yourself a glass of a good Soave while you stir. You can have a nap after lunch, which is totally traditional.
Butternut Squash Polenta With Sausage and Onion
In this savory, satisfying dinner, finely ground polenta and grated butternut squash are cooked together in one pot, the squash adding sweetness to the savory cornmeal. Then browned sausages and onions seasoned with rosemary and fennel seeds are spooned on top to round out the meal. It’s a dish simple enough for a weeknight, but the butternut squash makes it interesting enough to serve to guests.If you can’t find finely ground polenta, you can substitute coarse; just add another cup of water and plan on cooking the mixture for an extra 10 to 15 minutes. You could also substitute coarsely ground cornmeal for the fine polenta. Try to avoid using instant (or quick-cooking) polenta, but if it's all you can find, add the squash, salt and bay leaf to the boiling water 15 minutes before stirring in the polenta, so the squash gets a chance to soften. Just do not use the prepared polenta that comes in a tube. You can grate the squash the day before and store it in a plastic bag in the fridge.
Chopped Cucumber and Tomato Salad
Here’s an easy summer salad that’s always a winner. There are many similar chopped salads served throughout the Eastern Mediterranean, but this version with halved sweet cherry tomatoes is especially attractive. Your own take can be a variation on this one: Feel free to use large tomatoes, chop the vegetables as small or large as you like (roughly chopped has its charms), add other herbs like basil, mint or dill, or swap the feta for mozzarella.
North African Bean Stew With Barley and Winter Squash
This warming, highly spiced stew is rich in beans, grains and chunks of sweet winter squash. Feel free to substitute other grains for the barley. Farro works particularly well. If you’d prefer something soupier, thin it with a little broth or water before serving.
Roasted Delicata Squash with Peanut, Sesame and Squash Seed Dukkah
Steven Satterfield, an Atlanta chef with a deep love for green peanut oil, developed this recipe for a coming book on goobers from Short Stack Editions. Green peanuts are nothing more than raw peanuts. They have a fresh, vegetal flavor, and retain their greenness when cold-pressed into oil. Mr. Satterfield's spin on the Egyptian condiment called dukkah centers on peanuts and benne seeds (the preferred term in the South for sesame seeds), two regulars in many Southern kitchens. The spice and nut mixture brings life to delicata squash, whose tender skin doesn’t need peeling. You can substitute olive oil for the green oil when roasting the squash, and the dukkah will keep in an airtight container in the pantry for a month. Pull it out to sprinkle over greens, meat, fish or grilled bread.
Pickled Green Tomato and Mirliton Chowchow
Chowchow is a bright, aromatic Southern salad of pickled green tomatoes (you could use tomatillos in a pinch), cabbage, cauliflower and that most traditional Southern vegetable, mirliton (chayote squash). You could pair it with steamed or boiled shrimp, or pile it on a sandwich. Either way, we wager you'll do it again. (Sam Sifton)