Butternut Squash & Fennel Soup with Italian Sausage and Bok Choy

Put your oven on the high broil setting and prepare a small roasting pan. Evenly space the Diestel sausage in the roasting pan and place in oven on the highest rack. Broil for 7 minutes, remove from oven and flip the sausage. Place it back in the oven and broil an additional 5 minutes then remove it from the oven. When sausage is cool enough to handle, chop into bite-sized rounds and set aside.

In a large stockpot over medium heat, sauté onion, garlic and butternut squash for about 5 minutes. Add fennel and continue to sauté an additional 5 to 8 minutes, until onion begins to soften up. Add the chicken stock, turn up the heat slightly and bring to a boil. Add the bay leaf.

Remove the leaves from the bok choy and set aside. Cut bok choy stems in half lengthwise, then coarsely chop the stems. Also coarsely chop the bok choy leaves. Add the stems to the soup and turn heat down to a simmer. Add the chopped sausage to the soup. Simmer about 15 minutes then add the bok choy leaves. Simmer an additional 5 minutes (or until leaves are soft) and serve in heaping portions.