Butternut Squash Soup with Ginger Shrimp

5 Reasons Why You Should Make This for Thanksgiving

1. It’s one of those recipes that’s a killer because it’s both supremely impressive- I mean, this is a restaurant quality soup- and legitimately very easy to make.

2. A pot of this will serve as a first course for 8 people.

3. It’s light and fresh-tasting but it’s also bursting with Fall goodness. It’ll sate the Thanksgiving appetite but it won’t destroy it completely (hello, Pigs in Blankets, aka I can eat 50 of you like potato chips, aka Now I have to eat turkey? Why God, why?)

4. The most labor-intensive part of it is deveining the shrimp which is super gross BUT it can be avoided by purchasing prepared shrimp or frozen shrimp or making your annoying cousin Ronald do all the prep work on it.

5. Look how pretty it is! It’ll match your motif! Also, the combination of spicy, warm ginger and throat-tickling anise will bring a sense of calm over the table. CALM. On Thanksgiving. Who even knew such things were possible?

Butternut Squash Soup with Ginger Shrimp

Thank you, Bon Appetit

Makes: 5 cups or 8 first course servings

Ingredients

For Shrimp

1 lb of large shrimp, deveined and peeled with tail remaining
1 TBsp of fresh ginger, peeled and finely grated
1/4 tsp of salt
1 TBsp of vegetable oil

For Soup

2/3 Cup of shallot, chopped
1 garlic clove, thinly sliced
3 whole star anise
2 TBsp of unsalted butter
1 and 3/4 lb of butternut squash, peeled and seeded and cut into 1/2 inch pieces (5 cups)
4 Cups of chicken stock
2 Cups of water

Prepare

1. Toss shrimp with grated ginger and toss. Let marinate in fridge for 30 minutes but NO longer or shrimp will start to cook because they are weird like that.

While shrimp are marinating, we prepare the soup that will impress people. Yay.

2. In a 3-quart, heavy saucepan over moderate heat, cook shallot, garlic and anise.

3. Stir until shallot is softened. Cook about five minutes.

4. Add squash, stock and water and simmer, uncovered for 20 minutes or so (until squash is very tender).

5. Remove star anise. Coo to them, precious little babies. Thank them for their service.

6. Puree soup in 2 batches in a blender OR use one of those hand immersion blenders which are AWESOME and which I clearly just used for the first time.

7. Transfer to cleaned pan and keep warm, covered.

8. Sprinkle our shimp with the salt.

9. Heat vegetable oil in a nonstick skillet over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking.

10. Saute shrimp in batches until just cooked through, about a 1.5 minutes on each side.

Bring soup to a simmer, season with salt and pepper. Mound shrimp in each bowl.

Note: On Weight Watchers? This insanely delicious soup is 5 points per 1 cup serving and 5 shrimp is 2 points.