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New England Roasted Butternut Squash with Maple Brown Butter and Crisped Sage

Roasted Butternut Squash

This is what butternut squash tastes like when you stop being polite with the oven. Hot heat, generous fat, an uncrowded pan, and enough patience to push past pale tenderness into deep mahogany edges. Nutty brown butter and sage leaves fried until they shatter go on at the very end, with maple brushed in the final minutes so it glazes instead of burning.
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Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 35 minutes
Total Time 55 minutes
Servings: 6 People
Course: Side Dish
Cuisine: American
Calories: 215
Ingredients Equipment Method Notes

Ingredients
  

  • 3 lb butternut squash about 1 large, peeled and seeded
  • 3 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
  • 1.5 tsp kosher salt divided
  • 0.5 tsp freshly ground black pepper
  • 3 cloves garlic peeled, left whole
  • 2 tbsp pure maple syrup dark amber preferred
  • 3 tbsp unsalted butter
  • 12 leaves fresh sage whole, dry
  • 1 pinch flaky sea salt for finishing

Equipment

  • 2 heavy rimmed sheet pans half-sheet size, metal not glass
  • 1 sturdy vegetable peeler or a sharp chef's knife
  • 1 small skillet light-colored interior helps you judge the butter
  • 1 metal spatula for scraping up the browned faces

Method
 

  1. Heat the oven to 425 F with racks in the upper-middle and lower-middle positions. Put both sheet pans in the oven as it heats so they are ripping hot when the squash hits them.
  2. Cut the stem and base off the squash so it stands flat. Peel it with a sturdy vegetable peeler, going over any pale green streaks a second time until you reach solid orange flesh. Halve it lengthwise and scrape the seed cavity clean with a spoon.
  3. Cut the squash into even 1-inch cubes. Evenness matters more than precision here, since mismatched pieces finish at different times.
  4. Toss the cubes in a large bowl with the olive oil, 1 teaspoon of the kosher salt, and the black pepper. Work it with your hands until every surface is slick. Dry patches will not brown.
  5. Pull the hot pans out and tip the squash onto them, dividing it between the two. Spread the cubes into a single uncrowded layer with space between pieces, tucking the whole garlic cloves among them. You should hear a sizzle as they land.
  6. Roast 20 minutes without touching them. Then turn the cubes with a metal spatula, scraping under any that stick, and swap the pans between racks. Roast 8 to 10 minutes more.
  7. Brush or drizzle the maple syrup over the squash and return to the oven for a final 6 to 8 minutes, until the edges are deeply browned and slightly shrunken and a knife tip slides in with no resistance. Do not stop at pale and just tender. That is the halfway point, not the finish.
  8. While the squash finishes, melt the butter in a small skillet over medium heat. Let it foam, then keep going until the milk solids at the bottom turn the color of a hazelnut shell and the smell turns nutty, 3 to 4 minutes. Drop in the sage leaves and fry 20 to 30 seconds, until they stop sizzling loudly and go crisp. Pull the pan off the heat at once.
  9. Mash the roasted garlic cloves into the brown butter with a fork. Pile the squash onto a warm platter, pour the brown butter over it, and crumble or scatter the crisped sage on top. Finish with flaky sea salt and the remaining 0.5 teaspoon kosher salt to taste. Serve hot.

Notes

  • Two pans beat one crowded pan every time. Overlapping cubes steam and stay pale.
  • Brush the maple on only in the last 8 to 10 minutes, or the sugar scorches before the squash is done.
  • At the table, scatter over crumbled feta or goat cheese, toasted hazelnuts or pumpkin seeds. It sits beautifully beside roast turkey, chicken or pork, or spooned over farro with a sharp bitter-leaf salad.
  • Leftovers keep 4 days refrigerated. Reheat on a sheet pan at 425 F for 8 minutes to bring back the edges. The microwave turns them soft.
  • Skin-on wedges are a fine alternative. Cut the squash into 1.5-inch crescents, leave the peel, and roast 40 to 45 minutes.