Winter squash

We've been loving the winter squash the past couple of weeks. Last week we had acorn squash and this week, butternut. I prepared both the same way - sliced in half, put into a 350 degree oven on an old jellyroll cookie sheet with about 1" water for 40-50 min (about 30 min face down, then 10-20 face up, and that's when you add any toppings) until a fork goes in easily, brushed with a little butter and maple syrup. Good good good.

I've served the squash with curried christmas limas, israeli couscous, and/or simple green salad. A lovely fall meal, and though time-consuming, not much work as long as you can wrangle the toddler into a high chair long enough to open the hot oven! For the lima bean curry, I roughly followed this recipe, but needed only 1 tsp olive oil and used extra vegetable broth instead of oil where it says to add more oil if necessary to prevent the garlic and onions from burning.

As an aside, I haven't seen the need to use more than 1 tsp of olive oil for any of my sauteeing - and usually I don't even need that - just a quick spray in the non-stick pan seems more than adequate to add flavor and prevent sticking.