Aunt Rita's Butternut Squash Lasagna

Last November Chad and Betty and I made our way up to Maine before moving to Georgia (where we lived for a mere three weeks before Chad got a job offer back here in Maine.) We came to Maine on that trip to visit my Mother's side of the family and My Aunt Rita made Butternut squash Lasagna for us. It was Amazing! We both loved it just as it was but Chad has tweaked it a little to make it more masculine (he added sausage.) We've made this several times since then and always love it so we thought we'd share the recipe with you!

Ingredients:

•  a splash of olive oil.
• a big ol' butternut squash.
• water to add to the squash while it's cooking... like a cup or so.
• White sauce. Chad makes his own and I use the canned stuff. sometimes I finangle something out of cream of mushroom soup. Here's a good recipe.
• 1 pound pork sausage (we use the spicy Jimmy Dean kind but we've also used vegan sausage and it was good.)
• 15 lasagna noodles
• 3 cups mozzarella cheese.
• spices (nutmeg, salt & pepper and Italian seasoning - I don't have exact measurements but add what tastes best.)
• butter for pan.

Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to 375 degrees then cut and peel your squash into small cubes. This is a lot more work than one would think but it's worth it. Put all of your cubes in a large frying pan and coat them in water and your olive oil and then season to taste. cover your frying pan and cook, stirring occasionally, until all of your pieces are tender and squishy. Once your squash is cooled a little you can add a dash of nutmeg and then mash your squash - I only mash it a little because I don't like it to be completely smooth.

                             

     2.   In small frying pan begin frying sausage on medium/low heat. Fry until cooked all the way through  and then set aside.



          3.      Start preparing your white sauce. If you're doing this by hand then you definitely want to start this now because all of the other hard stuff is done if not then it's not a big deal when you start preparing it.

         4.  Boil your lasagna noodles! You can buy the no-boil kind but I haven't tried them before. after your done boiling them make sure to seperate them right away so they don't stick together.

      5.   Once all your prep work is done you can prep your casserole/lasagna dish by buttering it and then spreading a thin layer of your white sauce along the bottom.

   

      6. Build your lasagna by alternating layers of noodles, sauce, sausage, squash and mozzarella. I added in basil leaves wherever I could and then topped it off with salt, pepper, italian seasoning and parmesan cheese.





My little one for Chad's lunch the next day.




       7.    Bake on the center shelf of your oven for 30 minutes (add more time if the cheese on top isn't brown yet.) let cool for ten minutes and enjoy!

Yummm!

If you try this please check back and let me know what you think! Enjoy!