The Incredible Squash
It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s… The Incredible Squash! In a world, where summer produce reigns supreme—one winter gourd is determined to cross the boundary between savory and sweet, be the star of the plate, and (maybe one day) save the universe!
In a world, where summer produce reigns supreme—one winter gourd is determined to cross the boundary between savory and sweet, be the star of the plate, and (maybe one day) save the universe!
The butternut squash takes on two personas: one nixtamalized, one calcified. One filled with pickled almonds and one filled with ice cream. One drizzled with pork jus and one sitting above a candied orange purée. But both squashes, simmered in a spiced syrup and standing firm in its true and natural squash-slice form, prove the powerful versatility of the butternut.
SAVORY
For Chef René González of Imperfecto, creating a butternut squash dish starts with the shape (full recipe here). He decided to do a line cut, so the base of the squash, from top to bottom, is preserved. He then nixtamalizes the slice so, even after it’s confited in a winter-spiced syrup, the squash maintains its form and achieves a slight minerality. “Then we turned all the seeds and all the [squash] meat that is attached to the seeds into a horchata sauce,” says González. But rather than being blended with cinnamon and sugar, the horchata sauce is unsweetened and made with toasted basmati rice, garlic, smoky ancho chile, and the reserved squash seeds and meat. A small pile of punchy pickled almonds sits in the belly of the squash. “When you combine the sweetness of the squash and the pickled almonds, you get a toasty flavor. It balances everything really well.” It’s all accompanied by a juicy, dry-aged, slow-roasted suckling pig. “Our restaurant is [Mediterranean-inspired Latin American], so we are used to combining sweet, savory, and sour,” says González. “With the squash, we found a link to those flavors.”
SWEET
Pastry Chef Elisa Reyna has been eating squash for dessert since she was a child in Mexico. Growing up, her mother would make calabaza en tacha (candied squash cooked in piloncillo syrup) every year. She decided to recreate the dessert for the maïz64 menu, basing it off of her mother’s recipe with fine dining touches (full recipe here). Like González, Reyna starts by slicing the butternut, then soaking it in cal so it always keeps its shape. “It’s firm, but on the inside, it’s soft,” she says. She boils the calcified squash in orange piloncillo syrup and serves it with candied orange and a bittersweet orange peel purée. Back in Mexico, Reyna eats the syrupy squash slices with nata, a slightly sweet, slightly sour cream made from unpasteurized milk. Unable to source nata in Washington, D.C., Reyna makes a “cream ice cream” from Rancho crema Mexicana. “The flavor is so balanced,” she says. “The [ice cream] is so sweet, then you have the three different flavors [piloncillo, orange peels, and candied orange], and the texture of the squash.”
