Chicken and Butternut Squash Lasagna
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Lasagna is amazing, the ultimate comfort food. There’s nothing better than a veggie packed meal that tastes creamy, cheesy and yummy. This chicken and butternut squash lasagna is incredible!
This is a wonderful comfort food dinner with tons of veggies you won’t even notice.
I wanted to use some butternut squash to add flavor and nutrients to this white lasagna. I’m trying to learn to make recipes without tomatoes because recently I started having trouble tolerating them and other nightshades. I have always loved hiding veggies in my spaghetti sauce, but now that I can’t eat it, I wanted to make the same yummy dishes in a new way.
This creamy white cheesy bechamel sauce will send your tastebuds soaring. I couldn’t believe how amazing this recipe turned out. I’ll never miss the tomato sauce on this one.
Butternut squash lasagna recipe
I decided to add chicken to this because it sounded so good. My family likes meat, but you could easily make this without the chicken if you wanted a vegetarian version. I don’t think you could give up the cheese though. It’s the best part!
Butternut squash and chicken taste so good together, I like to roast a butternut and serve it as a side dish when I cook chicken any time. I also like to mash it and use as a sub for mashed potatoes. I can’t eat potatoes anymore. They make me feel sick. So I have to find nightshade free recipes.
I made a basic bechamel with a roux and some chicken stock and milk, then added some kale from the garden and some glorious cheeses. The combination was so delicious. I used provolone to make it really creamy, mozzarella for that traditional stretch, and of course parmesan for the taste. It’s my favorite. So nutty and good.
Earlier in the day, I tossed a whole butternut in the oven and cooked it until it was tender. I love this new way of cooking hard winter squashes because I always had such a hard time cutting them in half to prep them. You just bake it whole, slice it in half and easily scoop out the seeds and then proceed with your method of preparation. Easy breezy.
Once I got the creamy sauce figured out, I mixed the butternut puree in with the ricotta for the different layers. I also cleaned out my fridge and grated up some leftover veggies I had and sauted those up to mix in with the chicken. We ended up with 2 1/2 summer squashes, an onion, half a package of mushrooms, a whole butternut squash and two cups of cut up kale in this recipe. Lots of fiber and nutrients.
This combination of butternut squash and chicken mixed with the cheesy, garlicky, creamy goodness in this lasagna is one of my favorite combinations. I would be willing to bet that even your vegetable haters will love this because the veggie flavors are mild. I’m always looking for ways to give more nutrients from fruits and veggies to my picky eaters.
Chicken and Butternut Squash Lasagna
Ingredients
- 1 butternut squash
- 1 1/2 c chicken stock
- salt and pepper to taste
- 2 c grated assorted vegetables
- 1 box lasagna noodles, cooked
- 1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts or thighs, cubed
- 1 onion, chopped
- 1/2 pkg button mushrooms, sliced
- 8 T butter, divided in half
- 2 c ricotta
- 1/4 c flour
- 4 c chicken stock, divided
- 1 1/2 c milk
- 1 tsp italian seasoning
- 2 c chopped kale or spinach
- 3 cloves garlic
- 1 c shredded parmesan cheese
- 3 c shredded mozzarella cheese
Instructions
- Wash outside of butternut squash and roast whole in a 400 degree oven until fork tender.
- Cut in half and carefully scoop out seeds.
- Scoop remaining flesh into blender
- Mix puree with ricotta cheese
- Add 1 1/2 c chicken stock and salt and pepper to taste.
- Grate up leftover vegetables from the crisper
- Heat oven to 375
- Cook lasagna noodles according to package directions and dump into colander to drain.
- Put pasta pot back onto stove and add 4 T butter.
- Add chicken and cook until browned
- Remove chicken and set aside.
- In the same pan, add onions and shredded vegetables
- Saute, stirring occasionally until soft
- Add mushrooms
- Cook until done
- Add salt and pepper, stir, and mix into chicken.
- In the same pot, melt remaining 4 T butter
- Add flour and cook and stir until slightly browned
- Add milk and remaining 2 1/2 c stock all at once
- Cook and stir until thick and bubbly
- Add italian seasoning, kale, garlic, 1/2 c grated parmesan cheese, 1 c grated provolone and 1 c grated mozzarella cheese.
- Cook and stir until melted and creamy
- Remove from heat
- In a 9 x 13 casserole dish sprayed with cooking spray, add a scoop of sauce and cover bottom of pan
- Add a layer of noodles
- Add a layer of ricotta/butternut
- Add a layer of chicken and vegetables
- Add a layer of cheese sauce
- Repeat two more times
- Top with remaining parmesan and mozzarella cheese
- Bake at 375 for 45 minutes until slightly browned and bubbly
Butternut squash lasagna rolls
If you’d like to flip this recipe and make butternut squash lasagna rolls, just prepare all of the layers as stated. Then take one cooked lasagna noodle and place a spoon of each layer on one end and then roll it up.
Spray a 9 x 13 casserole dish with cooking spray and place the roll on its end in the pan. Repeat until all of the noodles are filled. Then take any remaining chicken and vegetable mixture and spread it over the top. Next, the butternut squash and ricotta mixture. And finally pour the remaining cheesy bechamel sauce over the top and sprinkle with remaining cheese. Bake it the same way as the recipe states.
Once it’s done, you can scoop out a roll or two for your plate easily. So cute and so good.
For easy dinner ideas, click here. For more ways to use butternut squash, check out this butternut and cauliflower soup and this butternut squash mac and cheese. And if you’re a soup lover like me, butternut squash soup is my favorite!
If you have grown a ton of summer or winter squash in your garden, find out what to do with excess squash here.
And you can make yummy squash dishes with summer squash soup. Two of my favorites are this hearty summer squash soup that’s chunky and roasted summer squash soup that is a blended soup.
And don’t forget these leftover chicken ideas:
I am not a cook, and this took me a long time to make, I also had bought cubed butternut squash so I had to make it a different way, I used thawed chopped spinach instead of kale, the flavor was good, I will make it again exactly as the recipe is listed.
I’m glad you enjoyed the flavor! Thank you for checking it out.