Cleaning Out the Pantry = Pumpkin-Sausage Lasagna

It may be too early for things pumpkin, but a casual inventory of my pantry reminded me that I had too many cans of pumpkin leftover from last year (as well as way too many bags of dried beans of all colors, two cans of Queen Anne cherries – what had I planned to make with those? – and lots of chocolate) so I was on a mission to use them now. Mind you, I’d still have enough pumpkin for a pie or a pumpkin cheesecake this fall.

My mother-in-law came through again with inspiration, due to the fact that the Rachael Ray show she had on TV that morning I visited featured Pumpkin-Sausage Lasagna. (My mother-in-law actually flips back and forth between Ellen DeGeneres and Rachael – doesn’t want to miss either, although usually Ellen wins more of her attention.)

So I returned home, found the recipe on the internet, and went to work. Although it will never replace traditional lasagna, with tomato sauce, sausage, ricotta and mozzarella (my husband’s favorite) or white lasagna, with spinach, chicken, and provolone (my favorite) it was a nice savory change of pace. There should be lasagna cook-offs, just like chili cook offs.

Now the original recipe called for starting with fresh butternut squash or pumpkin, but since that wasn’t my mission, I used my cans. I was also lucky that my fresh sage grew quite well this year so this wasn’t totally a pantry meal. (Although really one of my favorite things to do is rummage between the fridge and the pantry and come up with something great. Nine times out of 10 it’s great. We won’t talk about Number 10.)

So here’s my version. In addition to the can versus fresh, I also used hot sausage instead of sweet. Still a bit rich. Would skim milk in the white sauce be enough to slim it down?

Sausage and Pumpkin Lasagna
Adapted from Rachael Ray

2 -151/2 oz. cans pumpkin
Salt & pepper
Freshly grated nutmeg
3 cups chicken stock
2 T honey
2 pounds hot Italian sausage
4 T butter
3 T flour
1 qt whole milk
10-12 fresh sage leaves, very thinly sliced

2 boxes no-boil lasagna sheets

2 cups grated Parmesan cheese
¼ c flat leaf Italian parsley, finely chopped

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

In a large bowl, place the two cans of opened pumpkin and add a few grates of nutmeg, the chicken stock and the honey.

Heat a tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil in a large non-stick skillet over medium high heat and brown the sausage crumbling into small bits.

While the sausage cooks, in a medium pot, heat the butter and milk, stir in the flour then the milk. Season with salt & pepper a little more freshly grated nutmeg and the sage. Cook until thick, stirring occasionally, until thickened, about 7-8 minutes.

To assemble:

In the bottom of a 9x13 casserole, dot some of the pumpkin mixture, and then add a layer of pasta. Top with 1/3 of the cooked sausage and cover lightly with 1/3 of the pumpkin. Cover with another layer of pasta, 1/3 of the white sauce and ½ cup Parmesan. Repeat with 2 more layers, ending each with the white sauce and using all the remaining cheese for the top layer. Sprinkle the parsley on top and bake lasagna for 30 minutes. Uncover and cook about 15 minutes more to brown the top.

Serves 6 to 8.

Revisting White Lasagna

Sometimes, a cooking creation just goes blah. Not bad. Not good. Maybe so-so. That’s what happened when I decided I had a hankering for a white lasagna. I didn’t follow any particular recipe. Most recipes I did find for white lasagna were also vegetarian and I’m afraid I wanted meat. What I made was an amalgamation of stuff I’ve read and morphed into my cooking brain.

I’ve made lasagna hundreds of times. I even tried a couple specialty versions – a Mexican lasagna, with beans, cheddar and pepper jack cheeses and tortillas substituting for pasta; and a German lasagna, with corned beef, Swiss cheese and sauerkraut. All very good experiments.

So I wanted to experiment one more time with lasagna and make white lasagna rolls. I decided I’d spoon some ricotta-spinach filling onto lasagna noodles, then roll them up and pour a creamy, a little cheesy, white sauce over everything and bake. Pretty simple.

What I got was pretty simple, too – simply bland, even anemic. Time to ramp things up!

So it was back to the drawing board, without abandoning the basic concept, just spicing it up some. My first version depended on parmesan cheese alone to get the cheesiness I wanted. The second time, I added mozzarella. (I have to admit, I was trying to cut down on the calories.) I also added lemon zest and fresh nutmeg to the ricotta filling. That was all that was needed to change the taste. (And a little bit of freshly chopped Italian parsley on top to change the look.)

White Lasagna Roll-ups

12 cooked lasagna noodles
½ lb sweet Italian sausage
1 t fennel seed, crushed
1 - 15-oz container ricotta cheese
1 - 10 oz package frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed dry (about 1 cup)
1 egg, slightly beaten
¼ t nutmeg
¼ t lemon zest
¼ C butter
¼ C flour
2 C milk
½ C chicken broth
¼ t nutmeg
½ C parmesan cheese
Salt & pepper to taste
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
¼ cup Italian parsley chopped

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
1. Break up sausage in skillet and brown, adding fennel seed as it cooks. Drain and set aside.
2. Make sauce: In large saucepan, melt butter. Add flour. Over medium heat, add milk all at once, stirring often until thickened. Reduce heat. Slowly add chicken broth, stirring. Add nutmeg and salt and pepper to taste. Add drained sausage to sauce.
3. Make filling: In bowl, combine ricotta cheese, egg, spinach, nutmeg and lemon zest.
4. To assemble: Spray 13 X 9 pan with non-stick spray. Spread about ¾ cup sauce in bottom of pan, enough to cover bottom. On work surface, lay lasagna noodle flat. Place two large tablespoons of filling (about ¼ cup) and spread over noodle. Starting at one end, roll up and place, seam side down, in pan. Repeat with the remainder of noodles. Spoon remainder of sauce over lasagna rolls, covering each roll. Sprinkle mozzarella over rolls, too.
5. Bake covered with foil that has been sprayed with non-stick spray for 30 minutes; remove foil, and bake an additional 15 minutes, until cheese is lightly browned. Sprinkle with parsley.

P.S. So is it “lasagna” or “lasagne”? All I know is when I ran spell check, it said lasagna.
P.P.S. Mom's china looks great, doesn't it?