Cinderella's Coach - Time to Bake Those Squash

The squash bugs reduced the size of our harvest of winter squash and pumpkin, but we do have a few. Last night my daughter made a dish we call "Cinderella's Coach". It's a dish of basmati rice and shrimp coooked in coconut milk and baked inside a pumpkin. We had ours in a medium sized "Long Island Cheese Pumpkin", one of my favorite squashes. It's from a complicated recipe found in the old Time-Life International Cookbooks series, but here's a quick version.

Cinderella's Coach

Prepare one medium flatish shaped pumpkin or squash. Cut out a lid and clean out the seds and pulp inside. Bake in a pan of water for at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Meanwhile prepare the rice.

2 1/2 cups basmati rice, rinsed
4 tablespoons butter
2 medium onions, finely sliced
2 cloves garlic minced
2 to 3 chili peppers, seeded and diced
4 cups coconut milk (you can get a low-fat version that's very good)
2 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 cup seeded and diced tomatoes
1 pound of shrimp (optional) peeled and deveined
2 tablespoons rum

Saute the onions, garlic and chilis in the melted butter until limp. Add the rice and stir until it is coated with butter. Add the coconut milk and salt, stir and bring to the boil, then cover with a well-fitting lid, turn heat very low and cook for 25 minutes or until the coconut milk is absorbed and the rice is tender. Stir in the rum and the tomatoes. If you want to add shrimp to the dish saute the cleaned shrimp in some additional butter until just barely pink. Stir into the rice mixture and fill the pumpkin with the rice and shrimp. Bake until the pumpkin is tender and the mixture is very hot. This should take about half and hour. It depends on the shape and thickness of the pumpkin. When you serve the rice scoop up some pumpkin with each serving. It's delicious. How spicy the dish is depends on the variety of chilis you use. I like it spicy so I use habaneros.

Here's a nice gratin of squash and potatoes. Any winter squash will do. Butternut is one of the easiest to get.

Garlicky Winter Squash and Potato Gratin Recipe

Butter for greasing baking dish
1 large butternut squash (about 3 lb), peeled, de-seeded and thinly sliced
1 ½ lb potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced
6 cups milk
5 garlic cloves, smashed
1 cup grated gruyere cheese
Salt and pepper to taste
Dash nutmeg

Preheat oven to 400°F
Generously butter a large gratin dish, or casserole.
Spread the vegetables in the baking dish, alternating layers of squash and potato.
Bring the milk to a boil. Whisk in the garlic and pour over the vegetables.
Scatter the grated cheese over the top of the vegetables and season with salt and pepper.
Bake until the cheese is golden brown and bubbly, approximately 1 hour.


We like mashed potatoes mixed with other vegetables. Sometimes I mix pureed celery with potatoes. Sometimes we like pureed carrots and turnips added to potatoes. When I feel like splurging I'll buy a celeriac and add it coooked and mashed to mashed potatoes. Here's potatoes and squash.

Mashed Potatoes with Winter Squash
1 large winter squash (about 3 lb), peeled, de-seeded and chopped
4 large potatoes, peeled and chopped
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste
½ cup grated Parmesan cheese

Bring a large saucepan of water to boil. Add squash and potatoes and cook until fork tender (about 15-20 minutes) depending on the size of the pieces. Drain the vegetables well and then return to the pot. Mash the vegetables coarsely with a potato masher. Add the olive oil and cheese and mix well. Adjust seasoning. I like to put mashed vegetables in an ovenproof dish, sprinkle some extra Parmesan on the top and put it in a 375 degree oven for a few minutes to get the top browned a bit and everything really hot.