So pretty much every year for Samhain I go to my friend Anne's house for her gathering. Anne is Vegan, and a darned good little cook with mad-good recipes and such. She really spoiled us this year, so many Glutenless Goodies!! Go check her out, really! Love her!
Halloween colors were my inspirations for my Chili. At the party I added a little label, and it was a big hit. My label said: "Butternut Squash, Black Beans, Mushrooms, Sugar and Spice." And that is your ingredient list, pretty darned easy. It also made a killer dip for the sweet potato chips.
I think it kinda needed the label, though, because it's not a traditional looking food, people would have probably been confused. Who needs traditional? Yum yum yum yum yum!
So what happens when you plan out enough time, but then get out the bed-lifter broad fork in the garden and cause your back to seize up? Well, after laying on heat for over an hour, stretching a lot, and poking my own pressure points, I took a lot more shortcuts than I wanted to so I could still show up on time. Gotta watch those 40 pound, awkwardly shaped tools, seriously!
Start with one medium butternut squash (from my Uncle's garden), sliced lengthwise, de-seeded, with brown sugar in the seed hollow, cooked till tender.
- Ideally this would have been in the oven. 45 minutes at 350.
- With time limitations, microwaving it works. In a large bowl with 1 inch water at the bottom and a bit of water in with the brown sugar. 15 minutes on high.
- (This would also be really good with sweet potatoes instead of squash, by the way, with sugar added at the end instead.)
Black beans are something I just love. I usually have them around in both dried and canned form.
- Ideally, I would have simmered dried black beans for 40 minutes, draining twice.
- With time limits, this was two cans of black beans well drained and rinsed.
I was going to use the canned mushrooms anyways, one can sliced mushrooms, drained and rinsed, mixed with black beans, and microwaved for 3 minutes to get it nicely warmed up. Ideally, this would have been added to the mostly-cooked beans just at the end, or fresh ones simmered in a skillet quickly.
In a large bowl, pour in the sugar liquid from the cups of the squash, scrape the flesh of the squash into the bowl, and mash this as you would potatoes. Add bean and mushroom mix and stir in 1 tsp Cumin, and 1 tbs fresh ground coriander.
Gardener's side track again. Coriander is from my garden, and is in a pepper grinder. You don't have to grind it fresh if you don't have it that way, as long as it's ground rather than whole. I recommend growing it very much, it's so easy and self seeds every year so you don't have to worry about it at all. Once you throw seeds on the ground, you have it growing for good.
That's it. It was really easy and a tasty hit even in it's hurried-up version!
And my back is much better, too, of course. I saw my Chiropractor on Halloween Monday and he fixed me up. Yay!!
Oh, and THIS is a broadfork, by the way. Once I'm able to operate it without harming myself it's going to be just about the most useful thing ever.
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