Fall foods!

Chilly weather apparently makes me a fancy chef! I got very excited and for probably under $30 (shampoo, pasta sauce, and random other groceries were involved...) I made an amazingly tasty meal that could be eaten for days - if you weren't piggies like we were tonight ;) And if you're counting Weight Watchers points, altogether it was 16 (yikes!) but I hadn't eaten much today, and really you can get by on half of each dish and still be full :) Onto the main course!!

The first dish was fig and prosciutto bruschetta - I made 8 pieces, 4 each for me and Ted, but 2 would've been plenty!! They added up to 11 WW points for 4 items, so that's food for thought!! I got the recipe from Style Me Pretty, it's delish! The only thing I changed was mixing in the honey with the cheese, it takes out a bit of the bite of the Gorgonzola :)

Ingredients: 

1 loaf crusty bread (sour dough, French, Pullman, Italian, etc)
extra-virgin olive oil
sea salt
1/2 cup + 2 tbsp ricotta (I use part-skim to feel less guilty…)
3 tbsp creamy Gorgonzola, at room temperature (don’t use the pre-crumbled kind)
fig jam (often found at Whole Foods)
fresh black pepper
arugula
8 slices prosciutto
12 fresh figs (they should be plump, but still give slightly), gently rinsed
1 tbsp sugar
honey

Slice the bread into ½-inch thick slices. Brush each side with olive oil and sprinkle one side with sea salt. Set aside. In a small bowl, mix together the ricotta and Gorgonzola (and honey, if you want!*) until smooth and combined. Set this aside as well.

Heat a grill to medium heat (you could also use a grill pan over the stove). Grill each slice of bread for a minute or two, or until they are slightly charred with beautiful grill marks. Flip and repeat on the other side.

Slice each fig into quarters. Sprinkle them with the sugar. Now, at this point, you can place the sliced figs on a baking sheet and place beneath the broiler for a couple minutes or bust out a brulée torch and caramelize the sugar on each fig slice.

To assemble the bruschetta, spread one side of each piece of toast generously with the fig jam. Top with a nice layer of the ricotta-Gorgonzola mixture and sprinkle with a dusting of fresh cracked black pepper and a fair amount of arugula. Tear each piece of prosciutto into bite size pieces. Distribute evenly among the arugula topped toasts. Finish by placing 6 fig slices on top and drizzling with honey* (unless you mixed it in with the cheese like I did!). Bite into a bruschetta and enjoy!

Next I made butternut squash soup - this was actually healthy, about 2 C each and only 5 points!

Ingredients:
1 butternut squash, halved length-wise, seeded, placed face down in a couple inches of water and microwaved for 24 minutes
1/2 C 2% milk
1 T butter
1/2 onion
1 T olive oil
2 T flour
1/2 C chicken broth
1 t sage
1 t thyme
a couple dashes of Worcestershire sauce
salt, pepper to taste
small bit of orange rind

I sautéed the onions in butter, added oil. Then added flour to make a roux, added the milk and chicken broth and let simmer. I added the spices and sauce and salt and pepper, then scooped out the squash and threw it all in the blender for about 30 seconds. Done!! Easy but messy, and definitely fun and tasty!!