Roasted Butternut Squash Salad with Truffle Oil

Pairing a wine with this dish was a ton of fun. Chock full of butternut squash, mushrooms, white beans, parmesan shavings, and truffle oil, this warm salad is intended for cool fall nights. If it was chilly out, I would pair this with a Cabernet Franc, hands down, to bring out all of the earthiness.

To my pure delight, however, it still feels like summer! Now if only we could make the sun stay out longer. . . Since the night was still nice and warm when we sat down to dinner, and since I have been on a Riesling kick since Riesling #WineChat, I paired this dinner with an Austrian Riesling. There will certainly be time for reds and winter white wines, (Speaking of, this article on fall white wines on Palate Press is a great resource.), but a cold glass of Riesling did the trick with this dinner.

This is a very simple, rustic dinner, inspired by a similar, amazing salad I had at a Venge wine dinner years ago. The most time consumed is for the roasting of the butternut squash. I tossed a couple of cups of butternut squash cubes in oil and roasted them for 20 minutes at 380.

I then added in chopped baby bella mushrooms and roasted everything together for another 10 minutes.

The other steps in this recipe are easy. Drain and rinse a can of cannellini white beans.

Toss with the roasted butternut squash and mushrooms, then top with truffle oil and parmesan shavings. I like this Monini White Truffle Oil because it offers concentrated truffle flavor at a great value.

The end result is a delicious, hearty side or main dish full of flavor. You could always add in some chicken or chicken sausage for more protein to round the meal out, though I found myself pretty full after a bowl of this dinner and a glass of wine.

Flavors like this definitely make the earlier sunset a little more bearable and remind me of the good parts of changing seasons.

Have you found any new fall recipes lately?