Red Curry Butternut Squash Soup

A little creamy, a little spicy, and a little sweet, this Red Curry Butternut Squash Soup is guaranteed to satisfy on those days you just want to wrap yourself up in a blanket and feel cozy. This soup is super easy to make, uses only 6 ingredients, and is great for batch cooking. Plant-based, gluten-free and dairy-free.

Tips on making Red Curry Butternut Squash Soup

This is one of those recipes that’s super easy to make and is great for batching. You could even freeze portions for future easy weeknight dinners.

Making prep easy

When prepping for the recipe, here’s a couple things to keep in mind. First, you can often buy pre-cut butternut squash in the grocery store, which will save you time. Second, while you could make your own red curry paste, it’s just so much easier to buy it pre-made. Two brands that I like are Thai Kitchen (available in pretty much all grocery stores), and Mike’s Organic Curry Love.

Advice on Red Curry Paste

When it comes to cooking with the curry paste, I’ve suggested 4 tablespoons for this recipe (I was using Thai Kitchen brand). This produced a flavorful but not too spicy soup. You could use more or less depending on your desire for spiciness. And while you can add extra at the end, it won’t provide as much flavor as when you add the paste at the beginning of the cooking process.

Adding more flavor

To pump up the flavor even more in this soup, your best bet is to add garlic, ginger, and even lemongrass. You could mince a chunk of fresh ginger and a couple cloves of garlic and add them about 1 minute before you add the squash. And you could add a stalk of lemongrass (cut into 2 to 3 inch pieces) when you add the water (you’ll remove it before blending the soup). This is extra work of course but will provide more flavor.

Should you use vegetable broth or water?

In choosing your liquid, I’m in favor of using what you have on hand. You could use chicken or vegetable broth (be careful about the sodium content of most store-bought brands). But most chefs will tell you that the pre-made broths that you get in the store are pretty junky. Instead of using broth, I used water and added a piece of kombu into the broth during the cooking process (I removed it before blending the soup). Kombu is a dried seaweed you can find in the Asian section of the grocery store and is great for flavoring broths.

Serving the soup

This soup doesn’t need a garnish, but garnishes can be nice because they add a little more flavor and texture and pump up the visual appeal of your dish. Try toasting some pepitas (pumpkin seeds), chopped cilantro, or even shredded coconut (you could toast that too!).

Red Curry Butternut Squash Soup

Makes 6-8 servings

ingredients

2T coconut oil

1 medium onion, diced

4T red curry paste

1 large butternut squash (~3lbs), large diced

3-4 cups of vegetable broth (or sub water)

1 15oz can full fat coconut milk

Sea salt to taste

*Optional: chopped cilantro and toasted pepitas (pumpkin seeds) to garnish

Directions

Heat oil in a heavy bottomed pot, over medium heat.
Add the onion and sauté about 3 minutes.
Add curry paste, stir, and cook another 3-5 minutes or until onions are soft.
Add squash and stir to coat with the red curry mixture.
Add broth to almost cover the squash (about 3 cups, maybe a bit more).
Raise heat and bring to a boil. Then lower the heat and simmer 15-20 minutes or until the squash is soft and tender.
Puree the soup. Use either an immersion blender (easiest), or blend in batches in a countertop blender.
Stir in the coconut milk.
Taste. Add salt or more curry paste to taste.
Optional: garnish with toasted pepitas, chopped cilantro, or even some shredded coconut.

ENJOY!