Butternut Squash Curry with Chickpeas

Quick Highlights

• Vegan and gluten-free.
• Easy to make with simple ingredients.
• Ready in 45 minutes.
• Serve with rice for a complete meal.
• Freezer-friendly.
• Customize with different veggies.

• Butternut Squash: You’ll need one medium-sized butternut squash or about 4-5 cups diced. Sweet potato or another variety of squash would work well as a substitute. The amount doesn’t have to be exact so don’t worry too much about the size of the squash.
• Oil: You can use any kind of cooking oil you like for roasting the squash. I used olive oil.
• Coconut Oil: Coconut oil works well for sautéing the aromatics and veggies and toasting the spices. You can substitute another oil like avocado oil or olive oil if you prefer.
• Shallot: Shallot works great here but you can substitute another variety of onion if that’s what you have.
• Garlic & Ginger: For the best flavour, you’ll need fresh garlic and ginger for this recipe.
• Curry Powder: Use a mild yellow curry powder.
• Red Curry Paste: Use Thai red curry paste or substitute yellow curry paste.
• Crushed Tomato: Use canned crushed tomatoes or substitute canned diced tomatoes. Crushed tomato will make the curry base a bit smoother but diced tomato also works well.
• Coconut Milk: You can use light or regular canned coconut milk. Full-fat/regular coconut milk is suggested.
• Stock: Any vegetable broth or stock works. If you don’t have any on hand, you can use water.
• Soy Sauce or Tamari: Use any soy sauce, I prefer sodium-reduced soy sauce, or substitute gluten-free tamari if needed.
• Coconut Sugar: Just a little sugar to balance the flavours. You can substitute white or brown sugar or even maple syrup.
• Chickpeas (Garbanzo Beans): Canned chickpeas work fine or you can cook your own from scratch.
• Spinach: I think baby spinach is the best green to use here though baby kale would also work.
• Cilantro: Use cilantro or try Thai basil.
• Lime: Lime adds a little acidity at the end to brighten and balance the flavour.

Step-by-Step Instructions

Roast the Squash

The first step is to roast the butternut squash. This step caramelizes the natural sugars in the squash, intensifying the flavour for extra deliciousness!

Begin by preparing the squash.

Cut the ends off, peel it and cut in half in crosswise so you have the top half and the bottom half in two sections.

Cut each of those in half length-wise, then use a spoon to scoop the seeds out. Dice it all up into approximately 3/4-inch cubes.

Start the Curry

While the squash is roasting, you can get started on the curry.

Heat the coconut oil in a large pot over medium heat then add the shallots and cook for 3-5 minutes, stirring them often until they’re tender and fragrant.

Add the garlic, ginger, remaining curry powder and the Thai red curry paste. Cook the mixture for another minute or two while stirring to toast the spices.

Add the crushed tomato, coconut milk, chickpeas and 1 cup of broth or water, scraping the bottom of the pot to loosen any brown bits.

Season the mixture with a pinch of salt and pepper and bring it to a simmer over medium-high heat. Once it’s simmering, reduce the heat to medium-low and cook it for about 12-15 minutes until it reduces a bit (thickens).

Finish the Curry

To finish your curry, spinach, soy sauce or tamari and coconut sugar and mix for a couple of minutes until the spinach wilts and mixes in.

Stir in the roasted butternut squash, lime juice and fresh cilantro.

Notes

• You can use anywhere from 1-5 cups of broth depending on how thick you’d like your curry or if you’re making soup. Note that it will thicken substantially storing so I find about 2 cups works best.

Variations & Additions

1. Butternut Squash Curry Soup: This make this into curried squash soup, increase the broth to 4-5 cups.
2. Additional vegetables that work well are red or green bell pepper, green beans, zucchini, cauliflower or carrot. You can add up to 2 cups additional vegetables, adding them when you add the garlic and ginger. I’d suggest keeping it simple and only adding 1-2 extras.
3. For peanut curry, add 1-2 tbsp peanut butter when you add the coconut sugar and soy sauce.
4. For a lower-sodium recipe, use reduced sodium soy sauce and broth, use water instead of broth.
5. For spicy curry, add 1-2 Thai red chilis with the garlic and ginger. Be careful as they’re quite hot! You could also use 1-2 tsp sambal oelek or up to 1 tsp of red pepper flakes.