There is truly nothing like home made soup. Here in Vancouver we are fortunate to have a lovely local company that provides a bunch of original, tasty, fresh, organic ‘home-made’ soups to our mainstream local grocery stores. Yeah they cost a bit more but with a clean list of ingredients and outstanding flavour, it’s well worth it. When I’m in a hurry or just don’t feel like cooking, I buy their stuff and when I want to recreate those lovely exotic flavours at home, this Curried Coconut Butternut Squash Soup is what I make. With coconut milk, garlic, ginger, bay leaves and a hint of curry, this soup is downright delicious and perfect for entertaining.
This is the only way my kiddos will eat squash (!!!) and since we are still trying to plow through last summer’s abundant harvest, we make this often! 
Prepare all or your ingredients. In a soup pot, heat your oil over medium heat. Add your diced onion and cook for about 4 minutes. Add your minced ginger and your pressed garlic and cook for another minute. Gently add your bay leaves, salt, curry powder and cubed butternut squash and stir well to combine. Allow this to cook for 10 minutes stirring occasionally.
Now add your vegetable stock, cover and bring it to a boil and then lower the heat to a simmer and allow it to cook for 15 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes or so. Add your can of coconut milk and stir again. Cook for another 15 minutes, remembering to stir every 5 minutes. Remove the bay leaves.
Use an Immersion Blender
*Oil free? No problem! Omit the 2 tbsp of canola oil and saute your onion in a bit of water instead. Use canned low fat coconut milk if you’d prefer:)
Adapted from Lakshmi, Padma. “Curried Butternut Squash Soup”. Tangy Tart Hot and Sweet.
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- 2 tbsp organic canola oil
- 1 cup diced onions
- 3 cloves garlic, pressed
- ¼ cup minced ginger
- 4 bay leaves
- 5 cups butternut squash, cubed
- 1½ tsp salt
- 1 tsp curry powder
- 2 cups vegetable stock
- 1 15 oz can coconut milk
- red pepper flakes to taste (optional)
- In a soup pot, heat your oil over medium heat.
- Add your diced onion and cook for about 4 minutes.
- Add your minced ginger and your pressed garlic and cook for another minute.
- Add your bay leaves, salt, curry powder and cubed butternut squash and stir well to combine.
- Cook for 10 minutes stirring occasionally.
- Add your vegetable stock, cover and bring it to a boil and then lower the heat to a simmer and allow it to cook for 15 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes or so.
- Add your can of coconut milk and stir.
- Cook for another 15 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes.
- Remove the bay leaves.
- Use an immersion blender to puree.
- Allow the soup to simmer for another 10 minutes, adjust salt to taste and add red pepper flakes if you'd like.
This is my favorite soup. The one thing I do differently is to bake my squash so I can scoop it.
1/4 cup of minced ginger is WAY too much. I did this and my soup was bitter to the point of almost being inedible. Please limit your fresh minced ginger to 1 Tbsp. Otherwise, good recipe.
I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you. We love this and eat it often with the measurements listed in the recipe. We do love a lot of flavour and spice though:)
I agree! The ginger is what I love about it.
Have you converted this to an Instant Pot recipe? I’d be curious what the cook times would be if done in the Instant Pot.
Jeanie
I haven’t Jeanie but I will try soon as my garden is full of butternut squash (they are not quite ready yet!). Cut up butternut squash generally takes about 4 minutes so that may be a good starting point in case you beat me to it!