Hot Butternut Squash Gruyere Dip: When you want an assistant

For DS - who totally understands what I mean

I'm sure most of us have that desire - to have a personal assistant to do all the stuff that we don't want to do. Many of my friends say they want a personal chef, others just a personal paperwork filer and organizer, still others someone to drive their children to their 2,700 weekly activities, and those who simply need someone to help get everyone ready in the morning. In this day and age, the job of a parent is so intense, that there are more than a few moments in a single day where we think, "If only I had an assistant to take care of it."

For some of us, (ME) our spouses consider US as the assistant, in the manner such as fielding a phone call which leads on random wild goose chases finding something, filing something, or locating something. Sometimes I'm the dry cleaner to press the shirts, the filer of our paperwork and the organizer of all travel and vacation. I don't mind so much the job of assistant to Husband and for the most part simply handle it. But every fall, I realize that there are moments when I want MY OWN personal assistant.

What I need is a personal translator for the 30 or so email messages I receive in Korean from Children's Korean school. I'm fluent in Korean speech, and passable in reading, but the sheer volume of messages I receive from the school (3 kids, 3 times as many messages) makes me want to poke my eyes out. I find myself slowly and painfully reading each email message and at some point getting frustrated with the sheer volume that I STOP. READING. THE. EMAILS.

I tried to be really good about it this week, even trying to have google translate read to me the messages while I listened, which turned out to be much faster than my reading the messages on my own. But despite my best efforts to abuse the web for my advantage, invariably by the 13th message from Korean school I quit. I couldn't manage to keep up with all the messages, and what I really wanted at the end of the day was a bullet point "Korean Reader's Digest" of the emails.

Turns out, I failed. Daughter #2, who is probably by definition, my most anal and difficult child, showed up at Korean school without having done her homework. The anger and dismay shooting from her after Korean school was slightly humorous but more scary than anything. In her defense it was my fault that she didn't do her homework. In my defense, my assistant failed to show up to read all the emails and find the SINGLE email that had the homework assignment in it buried under the rest of the emails. And to further my defense, the others had no such homework to speak of and it was only Daughter #2 who had any assignment to do.

Sigh. If only I had an assistant to read through all the pertinent emails and give me the essence of what is important, namely HOMEWORK, I could focus on making such yummy simple things as this dish. Technically this dish is so easy I shouldn't HAVE to rely on an assistant and I could do both, but what fun is there in THAT? So, as you dream of an assistant, you can throw this dish together, pretend you have your own personal chef and enjoy this simple bit of decadence after a hard day without your personal assistant.

I decided to roast the squash first to give the dip a special savory sweetness and added garlic to the roasting pan to just amp of the flavor. The garlic mellowed with the squash and the overall dip just ended up being warm, comforting and delicious. With crusty bread, crisp crackers, it totally will fit in at your next gathering - with or without an assistant.

Warm Butternut Squash Gruyere Dip
Makes 3 cups, enough for 8 people

Ingredients
1 butternut squash, about 2 to 3 lbs, cut in half, seeds scooped out and removed
Olive oil for drizzling
salt and pepper
4 to 7 peeled cloves of garlic (choose your personal garlic level)
½ cup cream
½ lb gruyere cheese, grated
3 tablespoons finely chopped sage

Method
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Drizzle olive oil over surface of squash, and using hands, rub in. Don’t be stingy with oil. Toss whole garlic cloves with oil as well. Salt and pepper all over surface of squash and garlic. Roast squash in oven until tender, about 35 to 45 minutes. Squash is tender enough when the flesh yields easy to a fork or a knife. Remove from oven and set aside to cool.

When squash and garlic are cool enough to handle, prepare dip. Remove garlic from pan, and with a fork in a bowl, roughly smash until cloves are broken up. Using a fork, scoop squash, measuring two full cups of cooked squash. Add squash to garlic, and mix in cream, stirring until it is consistent in texture. Add grated gruyere and chopped sage.

In a ramekin or baking of your choice (I use small ramekins so I can have a constant flow of warm dip), preheat oven to 400. Bake until dip is golden and bubbling. Serve warm with crackers and bread.

Printable recipe