What's For Dinner: Stone Soup

Tonight was clean out the kitchen night at our house. We hit the grocery store for some staples (chocolate ice cream), then I tried to come up with the best way to use up our stack of leftover odds and ends. We began with:

2-3 cups cooked brown rice
3 wizened apples
a peeled but not cooked sweet potato (we over prepped for some sweet potato fries earlier this week)
a butternut squash
a few broken carrots
a few mildewy shallots
a cup of spinach
a quarter of a red onion

It was the butternut squash that led me to think SOUP, remembering a squash-and-apple soup recipe I read a few months back. It became possibly the best butternut squash soup I've ever tried, and so, I share with you:

Brown Rice Butternut Squash Stone Soup (with Apples, Spinach, and Caraway Seeds)

Peel and chop into evenly sized pieces:
3 apples
1/2 butternut squash
1 sweet potato
2 1/2 carrots

I stacked these in a large mixing bowl as I chopped, apples on the bottom and on up (think hardest to softest)

chop finely:
1/4 red onion
1 shallot
4 cloves of garlic

In a large pan, melt 1/4 cup butter, add onion, shallot, garlic. Stir until soft. Add enough vegetable broth to cover bottom, stir until it becomes creamy. Add carrots, 1 bay leaf, and a dash of caraway seeds (it just sounded like a good idea). Cook until the carrots are warmed through, then add sweet potato. Add enough vegetable broth to cover, boil until sweet potatoes are warmed through. Add squash and enough broth to cover. Bring to boil, add some salt. Toss the apples on top, put a lid on, simmer for 10 minutes. Add the rice and spinach, stir well to mix in rice.

When you can stick a fork in everything (especially the carrots!), you're done. Remove the Blend the soup (I used a blender, but it'd probably be easier with a stick mixer), return to pan. Serve!

Enjoy the empty kitchen and the full tummy!