Last night was a make-something-outta-nothing night. I had a lot of random ingredients in my fridge/freezer. Plenty of snacks, not much dinner material. I had some frozen organic butternut squash chunks that I found at Whole Foods a week or two ago. I didn't know butternut squash could be done in a microwave steam-fresh bag. Only at Whole Foods. Please note: though the squash was organic, please don't think I really care about that sort of thing. When it comes to the organic debate, I figure I haven't died yet eating the "bad" stuff, so I'm probably cool.
Anyway, I steamed the squash in the microwave directly in the bag (one less dish to wash - yay) and added it to a bowl of linguine. I then tossed in some pine nuts, pasta water, cream, parmesan, salt, pepper, and nutmeg. The dish took about eight minutes total to make. I pulled this recipe out of nowhere - and truth be told, I was nervous about putting butternut squash in pasta, worried the textures wouldn't work. Not only did the textures work (and the pine nut crunch was crucial here), the flavor was great. The nutmeg was pretty important. If you don't have this spice in your cabinet, wait until you buy it to make this dish.
I usually like fresh vegetables, but when you can go to a place like Whole Foods and find some more unique veggies in the freezer section, it's nice to stock up so you can create a last minute dinner if you need one. I also ALWAYS have pasta and fresh parmesan on hand because if I have those two ingredients I can almost always figure out a way to make a good dinner. Fill your kitchen with these ingredients and you'll never have to worry about overpaying or waiting for takeout.
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