Butternut Squash Pasta and More

Submitted by Wizzle Uploaded by Schpyder

A friend and co-worker grows vegetables. Lots of them. He gave me a bunch of squash and some tomatoes just as the squash topic was being announced.

(I had already cut up the butternut squash when I took this. The big curved thing? Yeah, that's a massive zucchini.

So I decided that since I was using his squash, I ought to invite him and his sister over for dinner. Of course, they're both vegetarians AND alergic to cow's milk.

That meant I had to make something almost vegan. Lucky for me they can have butter and non-cow-milk cheese.

So I made:

• Butternut Squash Pasta
• Spaghetti Squash Pancakes
• Zucchini Stuffed Phyllo Pouches

Butternut Squash Pasta

• For the pasta, I cut the butternut squash in to cubes and steamed it.

• Puree the squash. I left the rind on when steaming because it was easier to remove after the fact.

• Puree until very smooth.

• Start with 1c of squash puree and 1c of flour. Your results will very depending on how wet your squash was.

• Viola! A ball of dough. Took about 1 minute to make.

• Lots of flour on the counter is the key here. But next time, I'm so borrowing my aunt's pasta mill. Rolling pins are a pain in the ass.

• Yaay! Pasta!

• Cook the pasta like any other. Taste to determine done-ness.

• The pasta needed a sauce. The butternut squash wasn't as sweet as I had expected but the tomatoes were quite sweet, so, bonus!

• Saute onion in olive oil.

• Add pinenuts and garlic. Brown.

• Add chopped tomato. Season with basil and oregano.

Spaghetti Squash Pancakes

• And the pancakes. I was inspired by potato pancakes and the inherent stringy-ness of spaghetti quash made it work like shredded potatos. I didn't use onion though.

• Halve and steam the squash in the oven.

• Steamed and looking good.

• Tried to press out as much water as possible.

• Forgot to take a picture... but I put it in a mixing bowl, added 2 eggs and about 1.5 cups of flour.

• Prepare for frying! Use vegetable oil since it has a high smoke point. CLARIFIED butter is OK too.

• fry, flip fry, dry, keep warm.

• Pancakes need a sauce too. Why not a spicy Thai peanut sauce?

• Slop above in to a small sauce pan. The thing in the little baggie is grated ginger. Heat it up until it looks really gross. (You can see it in some of the above pics). Add water so it looks even worse, then gently heat it until the water incorporates in to the sauce. Continue heating (and stirring) until it's as thick as you want.

Zucchini Stuffed Phyllo Pouches

• And lastly, the phyllo pouches.

• Cut the zucchini in to strips. Then I covered them in sea salt so they would dessicate a little.

• Rinse them when done. There's enough salt coming.

• Zucchini. Meet Kalamata Olives and Goats Milk Feta Cheese.

• Lay the phyllo dough out in layers. Each layer needs to be brushed with butter. I used 5 layers.

• Also, sun dried tomato spread.

• Before baking.

• I didn't get an after shot, but I baked them at 350 for 10 minutes, then 375 until they were brown.

Serving

• Initial Plating.

This was paired with a Gewurtztrameiner from Alcase in France (on the German border). It was lightly sweet and complemented the meal very well.