Creamy butternut squash & pear soup

I love squash. Any kind of squash: spaghetti, acorn,  zucchini, pumpkin, butternut. Especially butternut squash. It's delicious, versatile, filling, and despite being almost impossible to cut and peel, fairly easy to cook. One of the easiest and best ways to use it is to make it into a creamy soup, which I do a lot. You can test it out with different ingredients too - sometimes I mix it with carrots and celery, sometimes apples. This time I used pears since we had an enormous amount at home (this happens often thanks to my mom's need to fill those grocery bags to the very top).

Preparation time: 20 minutes
Cooking time: 30 minutes
Servings: 5-6

Ingredients:

• 1 butternut squash
• 2 small white onions
• 2 pears
• Butter
• 1/2 cup cream cheese
• Salt and pepper
• 2 cups chicken/vegetable stock

Step 1: 

Peel the onions and butternut squash (here's a good tutorial for peeling & cutting butternut squash)

Dice onions, pears, and butternut squash

Step 2: 

Fry up the onions in butter until caramelized. Be careful not to leave them for too long because they will burn!

Step 3: 

Add butternut squash and pear.

Pour in stock and reduce heat to medium.

Step 4: 

Make sure squash has softened. 

Bring out the handheld blender and throw in the cream cheese.

Keep blending until there are no more chunks. You can also just use a regular blender or food processor (I don't because I don't like doing extra dishes. I'm the laziest, I know.)

Step 5:

Eat up and enjoy. I love it with grilled akkawi cheese!