Instant Pot Butternut Squash Soup

Once fall rolls around, I whip out all of my squash recipes - and this is one of my favorite! The instant pot really simplifies and speeds up the cooking process. You also need an immersion blender to make this soup. You could also use a high speed blender if you dont have an immersion blender, but the immersion blender is definitely faster. This recipe is based off of a similar one on Kristine’s kitchen blog, with a few of my own tweaks.

Serves: 6-8
Time: 30 mins prep, 30 mins cook time

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Ingredients

• 1-2 TBS olive oil
• 1 small/medium yellow sweet onion, chopped
• 2 tsp minced garlic in water (or 2 garlic cloves, minced)
• 3 cups vegetable or chicken broth
• 1 large carrot sliced into 1/2 inch pieces (or 1 parsnip, or 15 baby carrots)
• 1 large (3 lb) butternut squash peeled, seeded and chipped into 1 inch pieces (about 8 cups chopped)
• 2 TBS butter
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 1/8 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp ground nutmeg

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Method

1. Prep the Veggies: Chop all vegetables, keeping onion separate. Tip: to make cooking go quicker, peel and cut up squash earlier in the day so it’s ready at cook at dinner time.
2. Sauté the Aromatics: Turn the Instant Pot on sauté mode and then add the olive oil. Once the pot is warm, add onion and cook for 2-5 mins or until onion begins to look translucent. Add the garlic and cook for another minute. Turn off the Instant Pot.
3. Deglaze and Combine: Pour 1 cup of the broth into the pot and scrape off any bits sticking to the bottom of the pot. Then add all the remaining ingredients, including the rest of the broth, and stir.
4. Pressure Cook: Put the lid on the Instant pot and seal the steam valve. Cook for 10 minutes on high pressure on the soup function.
5. Release Pressure: After cook time is over, wait 10 minutes before opening the steam release valve being careful not to burn your hand/arm when the steam is released.
6. Blend and Serve: Once all the steam has been released, open the pot and use an immersion blender to purée the soup until smooth. Serve with sourdough toast and salad!