Football and baking

You may know that I find football and baking to be the best combo for a Sunday afternoon. And after the Badgers womped on the buckeyes yesterday how could I not be in the mood for a little more football?  Add that to a cool cloudy day with Joe off hunting, when I asked myself what do "you" want to do today I knew this was my afternoon activity.  So, I was focused and got my students grading done and a few other odds and ends in the morning, so I could have fun in the afternoon.

That being said, it was a sad football day for me.  Bad luck with the Pack and injuries this year!  :(   So I switched mid-afternoon to Top Chef repeats in the background, while I cooked.  The perfect fall day called for a perfect fall meal and since I was lucky enough to pick up an organic chicken at Whole Foods the day before we had:  Roasted chicken with roasted butternut squash and onions on top of a brown rice and quinoa pilaf, topped with a Walnut Apple Pear Pie.

I do love butternut squash.  I grew up more with acorn squash, but that is hard to peel!  Butternut squash is so easy to peel and cut up, so one can use it in so many more ways.  I remember one time I had people over and I was spreading the precut squash on the pan to roast and they all thought I was putting cubed cheese in the oven....but nobody asked why!

The chicken was perfect, but of course, I forgot to take a picture of it whole.  :)  So a picture of how caramelized the onions and squash looked with the pilaf and just a bit of chicken will have to do. 

The crust is whole wheat but the walnuts gave it amazing flavor and even more color.  Joe prefers crumble pie topping to a 2 crust pie.  It's not very sweet, but that allows the flavors of walnuts, apple, and pear to really shine.