Recipe

Butternut squash lasagna with bechamel

Photo by Kayb

This recipe was entered in the contest for Your Best Baked Pasta
Chef
Kayb's Notes: This recipe developed after I discovered that butternut squash with goat cheese makes a marvelous pasta sauce, and after I made moussaka that had the best bechamel I'd ever made. One day I...
This recipe developed after I discovered that butternut squash with goat cheese makes a marvelous pasta sauce, and after I made moussaka that had the best bechamel I'd ever made. One day I found myself with some extra butternut squash puree, and I began fiddling with assorted ingredients, having little idea where I'd eventually wind up. This wound up being it. It's a lot of work, but well worth it.

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Saute onion in 1 tbsp olive oil until soft; add garlic and saute for another minute. Add butternut squash flesh and stir well; crumble goat cheese and stir into hot mixture over low heat until well melted. Set aside.
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If using spinach (or any other fresh greens), saute in olive oil until limp and set aside to cool. Break up and saute Italian sausage until done. Drain.
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To make bechamel, heat water and 3/4 cup cream to a near-boil. Meanwhile, stir cornstarch into remaining cream, whisking until there are no lumps, and beat egg into that mixture.
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Pour a little of the hot water-cream mixture into the cream/cornstarch/egg mixture, blend, and pour back into saucepan. Add nutmeg.
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Cook, stirring or whisking, until sauce thickens. Remove from heat and stir in cheese.
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Put a scant 1/4 cup bechamel in the bottom of a 9 x 13 baking dish. Add in layers, lasagna noodles, half of squash mixture, half of spinach, half of sausage, half of ricotta or mozzarella, 1/4 cup parmigiano, and 3/4 cup bechamel. Repeat. Top with a layer of noodles, the remaining bechamel, and the remaining parmigiano.
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At this point, you can hold in the refrigerator up to 24 hours. Bake in preheated 350-degree oven for 1 hour, covering loosely with foil for first 30 minutes.
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