Just to give you an idea how this works, it is 4:06 am. Saturday mornings I generally wake up around 2:30-3:00 am. Sleeping during the day Monday through Friday can only be adjusted a little while remaining happy.
Today, I woke up and started to think I had slept a lot! So rested and ready to start my day. Here I am, just loaded the dishwasher, started a load of laundry, checked email, had a banana and some juice. Now, I can update my blog, pay my bills, or finish my book... You can see the choice I've made.
A beautiful, all vegetable lasagna on Thursday was created and I'm dying to show off the photos. I don't know about you, but any winter squash just makes me-a-hongry! Roasted, mashed, stuffed, sauteed, in a soup, or any other way you can dream up - I will try it.
Over Thanksgiving, we stayed at the Kidder's and took care of the Kridders. So, thanks to Wicket and Roger, I had a squash that Jane grew in her garden. Another reason I am thankful for the Kidder's - they have a bountiful garden and they share the yummy results with us!
We hadn't been grocery shopping since before the Thanksgiving-leftovers-turkey-and-gravy-binge, so I stopped off at the store and picked up everything I could think of that I wanted to add to my squash lasagna. Layer by layer, I built this lasagna. Jane's butternut squash was the perfect foundation.
On Thanksgiving, my dad cut the squash, which, I must say was great!! If you are strong and have a sharp knife, it is easy to cut a raw squash... I guess I am not as strong as I need to be. I tried to use the mandolin, which wasn't tough enough for squash, then I moved to a big sharp knife, which still lead to some challenges. But look at this - we have slices of butternut!When I walked into Royal River Natural Foods, the first things my eyes went to were the parsnips. They are related to a carrot, but sweeter, and more nutritious. Sounds good to me!
Baby Spinach, something green, to get me away from all of the sweet vegetables I was finding. Extra sharp, New York Cheddar cheese is always in our refrigerator, not matter what. We often buy other cheeses, though being lactose intolerant doesn't lend itself to eating lots of creamy cheeses, which I generally prefer. Cheddar has never lead me astray and is always there in my time of need! It is perfect in any lasagna, and it gives me little to no trouble.
I love that when you walk into Royal River, they always have fresh greens. No matter the day, there is spinach, salad mix, kale, arugula, and usually more. Mostly, they have the greens I need, just when I need them. This spinach was perfectly fresh, and less expensive than conventional spinach at Shaw's that morning. Another thing I should mention is that they often have bins of wine on sale in the front of the store. I buy a bottle every so often - and it is a great way to try different organic wines that would usually be outside of my price range.
Onion, carrots, pesto, sliced ham, and more cheese - the next layers. Whenever I make lasagna, I use as many layers as I possibly can, until it is bubbling out the top of the dish while it is cooking. It always settles back into the pan, and ends up being yummy every time!
The last of the butternut squash, orange peppers, and a final layer of cheese finished off this very Fall lasagna.
It doesn't look quite so orange from the side! I almost forgot that there was also some fresh basil in there. Pesto is amazing, specially Pecan, Garlic Pesto, but I love the flavor of fresh basil. So that had to go in too! Also - the basil aisle is before the pesto aisle... once you have basil in your basket, you absolutely can't put it back!
I have eaten this for 2 meals, the last 2 days! This should tell you that the end result was scrumptious. Yesterday morning when I came home, after a particularly physically demanding day at work the lasagna was calling my name. Though I usually have some whole grains at least once a day, and I had been missing that. I took a piece of the lasagna, warmed it, put it between two pieces of bread, and had a roasted vegetable sandwich! AMAZING! It was perfect because the vegetables settled into a rather thin dish in the end. I will try this again, and again. I think anytime you can take squash and have an excuse to eat it for a few days with leftovers - you have a winner!
