Sunday, March 23, 2014

Butternut squash lasagne

I bought a butternut squash before going to Halle in February and then didn't do anything with it since I ended up getting sick. Since I finally feel like I can't possibly put off getting back to eating and cooking properly (helped enourmously by going to a friend's for dinner last night for two delicious vegetarian dishes from the Ottolenghi book) I took the herby quark I bought at the same time and put into the freezer back out yesterday to defrost. I actually starting the day feeling like I was going to have another unproductive day but when I went into the kitchen just before one to get myself a very late bowl of cornflakes for breakfast I ended up turning on the oven, preparing the butternut squash and putting it in to cook. I actually hadn't found the recipe for lasagne again yet so forgot that they just saute the butternut squash in cubes - still, roasted with garlic and a red onion gives me just about the same, cooked squash that doesn't even need any more mashing or pureeing to use it in the recipe. The recipe doesn't call for it to be mixed with cheese or quark either - I think I was just mixing it up with the stuffed butternut squash recipe I often do. And hey, garlicky, herby, creamy butternut squash has to work at least as well as just mashed butternut, don't you think?

Since it's now cooked I thought I'd better just find the recipe and check I remembered it quickly. And of course I had completely forgotten about the white sauce part of things. No problem to whip up a quick white sauce though, right? I even have milk, not always a guaranteed thing. The one thing I don't have, however, is flour. I ran out in February and have completely forgotten to get some more in. So frustrating. So I could upset my day's planning to try and get out now to find a small shop open on a Sunday (there's a general Sunday shopping ban here for most instances, only touristy things are allowed open except for a couple of times a year - small tobacco selling type kiosks can open sometimes, too and some of them stock some basic groceries, too). Or just try it without the white sauce and sprinkle a bit more cheese between each layer. Decisions, decisions, decisions.

Edited to add the photo I had forgotten I took:

3 comments:

Baroness Prudent Spending said...

How about make the white sauce with milk, butter and cheese? Stir often and quickly. ~ Pru

Moonwaves said...

I was mixing the quark into the butternut squash when it occurred to me that I could have just thinned that with some milk or yoghurt and it would have probably worked. Silly really, it's not like I don't know how to play around to make things fit with what I have. Anyway, I actually remembered that today actually is one of those special Sundays that shops are open on and for once one of the supermarkets on my road was open too so it only took me five minutes to go and get some (although I did have to get my ass in gear to actually finish cleaning, have a shower and get dressed before doing that!). So it's in the oven now and I'm really hungry and looking forward to it. And then I realised that because I've been listening to Irish radio over the internet all day, I'm an hour behind myself. Oops. I'm meeting friends in town at 7 to go to a table quiz and instead of putting it in at 5, I actually only got it into the oven at 6. Maybe it doesn't really need nearly an hour's cooking like it says in the recipe!

Laurie O'Neill said...

Sounds good and I have butternut squash. I don't know what quark is but I love that word. I'll google it.