A Sweet, Creamy New Year's Day Soup - and it has bacon!

I googled New Year's Recipes on New Year's Eve and found The Pioneer Woman's website. From her list of 35 recipes I selected Butternut Squash Soup. I actually made it on New Year's Day, even though it says it's a New Year's Eve recipe. I also only made a half batch since the pandemic had only the two of us celebrating the start of 2021 together. I carefully added all the things I would need to make this soup to the shopping list of things James was going to procure, including the titular butternut squash. However, when he came home I discovered that he had neglected to buy one. Although we avoid multiple trips to the grocery store these days, he went back for this most important ingredient once we determined that it was indeed on the list!

As per the instructions I caramelized some chopped onions in the drippings left when I cooked the bacon then added the chopped pieces of squash to the pan along with some salt, chicken broth and water. I cooked everything on the stovetop until the squash was soft. Once I could cut the squash with the side of a fork I asked James for help transferring everything to our blender where it didn't take long at all for everything to purée. Once that was done it went back to the pan where we added some heavy cream and maple syrup. I split into two big bowls, and we topped with the crumbled bacon. So good, especially with homemade biscuits!

This is easily made vegetarian by skipping the bacon and cooking the onions and squash in olive oil and substituting vegetable broth for chicken broth. I image you can skip the cream and make it vegan as well.