Salad: Roasted Butternut Squash, Onions, and Fresh Greens

Is a green salad included on your Thanksgiving table? I rarely hear of green salads as part of the holiday must haves. But, I’ve been wrong before. A few years ago, I created a Holiday Salad that I now include in most of my holiday meals. But that beloved salad has some competition. My girlfriend brought over a salad the other evening that knocked my socks off. I’d like to share it with you. But here’s the deal–this salad requires a little more than just throwing a few things together. It involves a lot of olive oil and roasting. So don’t make this unless you are planning on spending a bit of time in the kitchen. If you do, you will be the talk of the town. I copied my uber cool girlfriend and made this salad last week. For a few minutes, I felt very popular.

Roasted Butternut Squash and Onions with Fresh Greens and Apples

Fresh Greens With Roasted Butternut Squash and Onions

Ingredients:
4 cups Butternut squash, peeled and diced
1 onion, thinly sliced
2 apples,diced, peels kept on (You decide the type of apple. I use honeycrisp or gala.)

Romain lettuce (or spring mix or baby spinach), hand torn into bite sized pieces

Additional add ins: (I won’t give you measurements so you can decide how much flavor you want)

homemade croutons
crumbled blue cheese or gorgonzola
sliced almonds
crumbled bacon

Toss diced butternut squash and sliced onion with ¼ cup good olive oil. Spread squash and onion on greased jelly roll pan and roast in 450 degree oven until vegetables are tender and slightly browned. While veggies are in oven, make croutons (those directions can be found here). Once bread and veggies are completely cooled, toss with greens, and other add-ins listed above. Dress salad a few minutes before serving.

On my girlfriend’s advice, I use Ina Garten’s dressing for this salad, found here. If you don’t know about this dressing, you should. It is a basic dressing that turns any blah-blah-salad into a can’t-stop-eating-it-salad.