Skip to content
Open menu Close menu

Feed your appetite for cooking with Penguin’s expert authors

penguin logo

Red-Cooked Butternut Squash

A simple vegetarian recipe with butternut squash as the star. A mix of sweet and savoury is created with peanut oil, cinnamon sticks, five spice and soy sauce.

Introduction

This is a simple but delicious dish that can be served as an accompaniment or as a main vegetarian dish alongside vegetables ‘Red-cooked’ is a term used in Chinese cuisine to describe a sauce that uses light and dark soy, sugar and spices (such as star anise) to create a deep reddish-brown braising liquid to flavour meat, fish or eggs. This is a quick red-cooked dish using butternut squash; the result is a sweet and savoury spiced dish.

Read more Read less

Ingredients

1 medium butternut squash, halved lengthways and peeled
1 tbsp peanut oil
2.5cm (1in) piece fresh root ginger, peeled and grated
3 star anise
2 cinnamon sticks, about 7.5cm (3in) each
4 tbsp light soy sauce
2 tbsp dark soy sauce
250ml (9fl oz) hot water
A pinch of Chinese five-spice powder
1 heaped tbsp brown sugar
For the garnish:
A small handful of fresh coriander

Essential kit

You will need a wok.

Method

Scoop out and discard the seeds from the squash and cut the flesh into bite-sized(2.5cm/1in) pieces.

Heat a wok over medium-high heat, then add the peanut oil. Add the ginger, star anise and cinnamon and stir-fry for a few seconds, then add the squash and stir-fry for 1 minute. Season with both soy sauces and stir-fry for 1 minute. Add the hot water and stir to combine. Cover the wok and cook, stirring occasionally, until the squash is tender – about 10 minutes. Add more water if necessary to keep the squash from sticking to the sides of the wok. Season with the five-spice and brown sugar and toss well. Remove from the heat and stir to combine. Garnish with the coriander, then serve.

Comments are closed.

newsletter

Subscribe to The Happy Foodie email newsletter

Get our latest recipes, features, book news and ebook deals straight to your inbox every week