Delishytown

Sweet Butternut Squash Lasagna

This is delicious and healthy. Well, somewhat healthy, besides the massive amounts of cheese I used. But cheese has calcium. We all need calcium for strong bones and flavor.

This delicious lasagna was made from the last of our Butternut Squash from the vine that took over the back yard. I'm amazed how colorful the inside of this one was, compared to the last one I cooked. You can see the color difference from a squash from the same vine, same harvest day, which I photographed a month ago, which was a lighter orangey yellow. This squash I used today has been sitting on the sideboard for a month. I didn't realize it was ripening more and more each day. When I cut this one open it was an amazing, intense deep orange inside. I'm pretty sure all that color translates to sugars developing, which translates to delectable sweetness. I saved the seeds to plant again next spring.  

Here's how to make sweet butternut squash lasagna.

Cut a butternut squash in half. Scrape out the seeds with a spoon. Save the seeds, roast some of them, plant a few next spring. Season the cut halves with salt & pepper, and a drizzle of olive oil. Bake at 350, cut side down, 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Chop 1 small sweet onion and 1 shallot. Saute in 1 tsp butter and 2 tsp olive oil. Add a few cloves of fresh chopped garlic and cook for about 2 minutes more on low heat. Season with salt and pepper. 

Boil salted water for lasagna noodles. Cook noodles, rinse with cold water, drain and set aside.

Make a bechamel sauce by melting 1 tablespoon butter with 1 tablespoon flour. Cook these two together until the flour is just cooked, about a minute. Deglaze and whisk with stock or milk, about 1 cup. 

Scoop the cooked squash out of the shells. Discard shells. Chop the cooked squash. Mix in the onion, garlic and shallot, salt and pepper and a grating of fresh nutmeg. You could also season with a little smoked paprika here, if you want a bit of a smoky flavor.

Spread half of the squash mixture on the bottom of your buttered lasagna pan. Top that layer with some grated parmesan cheese and a little bit of the bechamel. Add a layer of noodles, a layer with fresh ricotta cheese mixed with a little fresh chopped parsley or basil, and some parmesan cheese. Add a little more of the bechamel, another layer of noodles, the other half of the cooked squash mixture, then for the very top layer as much cheese as you want and the last bit of the bechamel. I used a couple slices of provolone, about 1/2 cup of grated white cheddar and a big grating of parmesan. 

Bake the lasagna at 350 for an hour until it's all bubbly and melted and  amazing. Yum!

Cheesy Butternut Squash Bake

This delicious Butternut squash volunteered in our garden.* Can you believe how big and beautiful this thing is? I love home grown food. 

This hard shelled type of squash is called "Winter squash" because the hard shell gives the squash a long shelf life. You can harvest them in Fall and keep them to use through the Winter. We harvested about 10 of these from this one very large plant, that grew in 3 different directions. We ate a few of them when they were small and green and used them like zucchini when the shells were still tender. So, overall, I'd say this plant gave us more than 25 to 30 squashes in different stages of ripening.

Fully ripened Winter squash are easy to prepare.

Cut in half and remove seeds. (Keep the seeds to throw in a sunny spot in your garden for volunteer squash vines next spring.)

Spray the cut side of the squash with a little olive oil spray. Season with salt and pepper.

Bake at 375 for 40 minutes or so. Scoop out the cooked squash. Mix with about 1 or 2 tblsp butter, or use olive or coconut oil for a vegan version.  Season with salt and pepper and a little fresh grated nutmeg. You can add a little cream if you want this to be super creamy, but it doesn't really need it. The squash is delicious as is and the twice baking just makes it taste even better.

Place in a buttered casserole dish, top with fresh grated parmesan or cheddar cheese and bake again until the cheese is bubbly, about 20 minutes. Yum!

*This plant came out of a spot in the garden where I was doing spot composting last year, adding kitchen scraps and straw to a patch of dirt that didn't have much life in it. I do spot composting to add life to the soil, it brings lots of earthworms to the area that's being spot composted and makes the soil soft and fertile for planting. And you get surprise plants popping up the next year.