Baked Pasta with Sausage and Butternut Squash Sauce

OK so by now you would have figured out that I love butternut squash be it in soups, chocolate chilli or just plain old roasted.

Or if you haven’t already then you soon will.

So when I come across a new way of cooking with it – that involves making my food healthier then I can’t help but love it even more. One of the food blogs I frequent is Lindsay’s Pinch of Yum. In between teaching and running an orphanage she still finds time to come up with yum inspiring recipes. I liked her baked rigatoni pasta recipe so much that I made my version of it 3 times in 2 weeks.

Butternut squash sauce is rich and creamy without the cream. I can see this replacing a lot of the cream based pasta sauces in my repertoire. It is a doddle to make. Simply boil the butternut squash with onions, garlic, ginger and other seasonings of your choice for about 10 mins. Then puree the sauce and you are good to go.

Both the ginger and the spicy sausage bring a nice depth of flavour to this dish. That and of course it makes sausage fiend OH super happy. Baby spinach is an easy green addition to this dish but you can also add in wilted swiss chard.

The last time I served this dish was at a supper party with some rather exhausted guests after a long day. They were really perplexed as to why I was photographing supper rather than just feeding them. I guiltily mumbled food blog, 5 minutes and it will taste better for the wait. So thank you D & O for being such nice guests and for putting up with my food photography.

So here is baked pasta with spicy sausage and butternut squash sauce. And please leave a comment telling me what you think.

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5 from 1 vote

Baked Pasta with Sausage and Butternut Squash Sauce

Healthy baked pasta in a creamy butternut squash sauce

Prep Time15 mins

Cook Time40 mins

Total Time55 mins

Course: Main

Servings: 4

Calories: 786kcal

Author: Bintu Hardy | Recipes From A Pantry

Ingredients

• 400 g (14 oz) fusilli pasta
• 8 sausages spicy or otherwise
• 1 medium butternut squash 500g when chopped
• 2 onions
• 2 garlic cloves
• 830 ml (3 ½ cups) stock
• 1 tbsp ginger
• 1 tsp mixed herbs
• Salt
• 60 ml (¼ cup) double cream optional
• 250 g (1 cup) cheddar cheese
• 125 g (2 ¼ cups) spinach packed

Instructions

• Cook your pasta in some salted boiling water till it is very slightly undercooked (about 2 mins less than required) then set aside somewhere warm.
• Bake the sausages, then chop in to bite sizes pieces and set aside.
• Peel and chop the butternut squash, onions and garlic.
• Bring the stock to the boil and add in the butternut squash, onion, garlic, ginger, mixed herbs and some salt. Cover and simmer for about 10 mins until the butternut squash is soft.
• Take this off the heat and allow to cool and puree with a hand held blender.
• Add the cream and two thirds of the cheese into the butternut squash sauce, mix well and adjust seasoning.
• Preheat the oven to fan assisted 170ºC/190ºC/375ºF/Gas5
• Add the pasta, sausage and spinach in to a baking dish and mix in the butternut squash sauce.
• Sprinkle the remaining cheese on top of the pasta and bake for about 20 mins until golden on top.
• Enjoy.

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Nutrition

Calories: 786kcal | Carbohydrates: 100g | Protein: 32g | Fat: 29g | Saturated Fat: 17g | Cholesterol: 87mg | Sodium: 1275mg | Potassium: 999mg | Fiber: 7g | Sugar: 10g | Vitamin A: 17505IU | Vitamin C: 39.6mg | Calcium: 591mg | Iron: 3.7mg