Roast the squash, crisp the chickpeas

Name: Roast the squash, crisp the chickpeas
Total time: 30 min
Yield: 2 servings
Cuisine: Middle Eastern
Ingredients: 1 delicata squash, halved, seeded and cut into half-moons; 1 × 15.5 oz can chickpeas, drained and patted dry; 2 oz arugula; 2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped; 2 oz feta, crumbled; 1 ½ tbsp dried tart cherries; 1 bunch mint, leaves picked; 1 tbsp fig jam; 1 tbsp pomegranate molasses; 2 tsp honey; 1 lemon, quartered; olive oil, salt, pepper

Two things get browned properly and the dressing is mostly jam. It eats like dinner, not like a side.

At a Glance

Time

30 min

Adjust servings

Story

Delicata is the one winter squash you do not peel. The skin goes tender in the oven and holds the half-moons together, which is why this is the squash for a salad and butternut is not. The chickpeas want the opposite treatment. Dry them properly, then leave them alone in a hot dry-ish pan without stirring, and the outsides blister and split while the insides stay creamy. Stir them and you get a pan of warm chickpeas, which is a different and worse thing.

Ingredients

1 delicata squashhalved, seeded and cut into half-moons
1 × 15.5 oz can chickpeasdrained and patted dry
2 oz arugula
2 cloves garlicroughly chopped
2 oz fetacrumbled
1 ½ tbsp dried tart cherries
1 bunch mintleaves picked
1 tbsp fig jam
1 tbsp pomegranate molasses
2 tsp honey
1 lemonquartered
olive oilsalt, pepper

Method

A salad in the sense that it arrives cold in places, but nobody is going to mistake it for a starter. The dressing is fig jam and pomegranate molasses, which means it is thick, sweet and sour all at once, and it clings.

Oven to 450F. Squash on a sheet pan with olive oil, salt and pepper, spread properly apart. 20 to 24 minutes, until the edges have gone dark and the flesh gives.
While that happens, whisk the fig jam, pomegranate molasses, honey, the juice of two lemon wedges and a long pour of olive oil. Season it. It should be thick enough to coat a spoon.
Film of olive oil in a pan over medium-high. Chickpeas in one layer, then hands off for 5 to 7 minutes. They will pop, which is normal and briefly alarming. Garlic in for the last 2 to 3 minutes, off the heat, then the juice of the last lemon wedges.
Everything into a big bowl, arugula and dressing together. Toss until the leaves are barely wilting from the heat of the squash.
Cherries, feta and torn mint over the top. Tear the mint at the last second; cut mint goes black and sulky within minutes.