STEEMIT CULINARY CHALLENGE #43 - BUTTERNUT SQUASH PAPPARDELLE WITH HARVEST VEGETABLES AND HONEYED WALNUTS

Autumn is the best. Fall is amazing.

This season and it's special food deserve the deluxe treatment. To the rescue is the Steemit Culinary Challenge, hosted by the theme mastermind herself, @woman-onthe-wing, to celebrate the wonders of Fall!

Sponsored by @grincalicious and @sirwinchester, the Steemit community is incredibly fortunate to be able to showcase our favorite Fall meals in a two-week challenge featuring both Savory and Sweet dishes.

This post contains my savory dish. Here's my recipe for homemade butternut squash and nutmeg-spiced pappardelle pasta (made without a machine!), topped with harvest vegetables in creamy butternut squash sauce, and finished with crunchy honey-nutmeg walnuts.

This was my first time making fresh pasta, and I'll tell you it won't be my last. The pasta came together pretty easily, even without a pasta machine! I can't wait to experiment with all sorts of flavors and colors of pasta. For this pappardelle (wide ribbons), I incorporated a generous amount of roasted butternut squash puree and added a hint of nutmeg. The result is that the pasta is no longer just the vehicle for other fall flavors, but instead, the pasta is part of the fall flavor collection that makes up this dish.

If you haven't made your own pasta before, take it from a beginner that it's within your reach!

Now let's get on with it! Here's how to make this fabulous Fall feast:

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Butternut squash and nutmeg pappardelle

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 c all purpose flour
• 1 3/4 c semolina flour
• 2 t salt
• 2 T olive oil
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 c butternut squash puree
• 1 t nutmeg

Directions

• Combine the flours, salt, and nutmeg on the countertop and make a well in the center of the pile.
• Add your oil, butternut squash, and eggs to the center well and use a fork to whisk together the eggs, oil, and squash.

• Use your fork or hands to slowly incorporate the flour mixture with the wet ingredients. Add water as you go so that the flour is fully incorporated.

• Knead the dough for about 5 minutes until it is pliable and uniform, tacky but not sticky.

• Allow the dough to rest for about 30 minutes on the countertop, covered with a damp towel.
• After it's rested, cut the dough into four pieces.

• One by one, use a rolling pin to roll the dough as thin as you can get it. Flour your workbench with semolina to avoid having the dough stick. Rotate the dough between passes of the rolling pin so that all of the sides of the dough are of even thickness.

• Fold the sheet of dough in half and then in half again, and using a sharp knife, cut parallel lines to form the pappardelle ribbons.

• Unfold each ribbon and lay it flat on a floured towel.

• Repeat with each fourth of dough, and stack additional floured towels as needed.
• Sprinkle semolina on the finished pasta and keep it on the countertop until you're ready to boil it.
• If you won't be using it all for this meal, then place it in a ziploc bag and stick it in the fridge for up to a week, uncooked.

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Harvest vegetables

Ingredients

• 1 lb mushrooms, sliced
• 2 bell peppers, roughly chopped
• 10 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 cups cooked butternut squash, diced
• 3 medium beets, diced
• 1 small eggplant, diced
• 1 zucchini, cut into semi circles
• 1/2 head cauliflower, cut into small florets
• 1 bunch kale, chopped
• 1 long sprig rosemary
• 5 sprigs thyme
• 1/4 cup olive oil, or enough to coat vegetables
• salt

Directions

• Coat all of the vegetables (except for the kale, rosemary, and thyme) and garlic in olive oil, then sprinkle with salt.
• Bake at 350F for about 20-30 minutes, until cooked through.

• Set the butternut squash aside to be used in the creamy butternut squash sauce
• Heat about 1T olive oil over medium heat, with the rosemary, 2 cloves chopped garlic, and thyme.
• Toss the chopped kale in the oil and cook until wilted and soft.

• Remove the rosemary and thyme, and add the baked vegetables, mixing them to combine all of the vegetables.

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Honey-nutmeg walnuts

Ingredients

• 1/2 c walnut haves
• 1 T honey
• 1/2 t salt
• 1/4 t nutmeg

Directions

• Toss walnuts in the honey, salt, and nutmeg

• Toast in the oven at 350F for about 10 minutes, until fragrant but not burnt. Watch these babies carefully so they don't burn!

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Creamy butternut squash sauce

Ingredients

• baked and roasted butternut squash (from the vegetable step!)
• 1/4 c heavy cream
• 2-3 T olive oil
• 1/4 c water, as needed to loosen sauce

Directions

• Mash the squash with the oil and cream in a saucepan over medium heat.

• To make a smooth sauce, puree the mixture of squash, oil, and cream in the blender, adding water as needed to loosen the consistency of the sauce.

You'll be adding a bit of pasta water to the sauce before dressing the pasta, so don't worry if the sauce is a bit on the thick side. (It won't stay that way!)

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Assembly

• Combine all of the cooked vegetables and toss in about 1/3 cup of the creamy butternut squash sauce, until everything is lightly coated.

• Set all of the veggies aside until the pasta is cooked.
• In a pot of generously salted boiling water, cook the pasta for a quick 2-3 minutes. (It was so fast I didn't get a photo of it!)
• While the pasta is cooking, in a pan over low heat, combine a ladle of the pasta water with about 1/2 cup of the creamy butternut squash sauce, to loosen it up a bit.

• Once the pasta is cooked al dente, quickly transfer it to the creamy butternut squash sauce, and gently toss to coat the pasta.

• Plate your pasta, adding the harvest vegetables and then the honey-nutmeg walnuts to the top of the pile. :)

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All mixed up...yummm.

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Seriously enjoy this meal. It's a good one, and it makes enough for a family of four with leftovers!

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I nearly forgot a photo of the dish with my nametag. Here it is!

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Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this post, please do check out my blog.

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All content and images by @jaymorebeet, taken on September 28, 2017 with a Canon 7D Mark II.