Protein Butternut Squash Lasagna

If you want to make this soy-free, you could use soy-free tofu – I’ve seen pumpkin seed tofu, fava bean tofu and chickpea tofu! You would also need to use a different plant-based milk as well.

This Protein Butternut Squash Lasagna is a time consuming recipe, but it’s also the perfect Fall meal. It’s so cozy! Because of the alternating layers of butternut squash sauce, spinach and mushrooms, and homemade vegan ricotta, it packs in a ton of interesting flavors!

This recipe is great for meal prepping or feeding a large family! It freezes well too!

Ingredients

Butternut Squash Sauce

• Onion – I prefer to use yellow, white or sweet onions for this recipe.
• Garlic – I use fresh garlic, because I’m picky and I think it tastes better. But you can use pre-minced garlic to save some time!
• Butternut Squash – fresh or frozen butternut squash will work equally well for this recipe!
• Soy milk – this is my personal favorite plant-based milk, but you can use your favorite!
• Salt, Italian seasoning, rubbed sage
• White Wine Vinegar – if you don’t have white wine vinegar, another mild vinegar could also work like apple cider vinegar!
• Extra virgin olive oil

Mushroom Spinach Filling

• Mushrooms – I used Baby Bella Mushrooms, but any mild mushroom would work great.
• Onion
• Spinach – I used fresh. If you want to use frozen, don’t use 8 cups LOL. I think it would be more like 1 cup of frozen spinach if you’re going that route.
• Garlic
• White Wine Vinegar
• Salt

Tofu Ricotta

• Extra/Super Firm Tofu – Super Firm Tofu comes vacuum packed and doesn’t need to be pressed. If you’re using extra firm tofu, you’ll need to press it before using it to drain off some of the excess water. If you don’t have a tofu press, some heavy books will also work. What else are college textbooks for?
• Nutritional yeast – if you’re newer to plant-based/non-dairy cooking, nutritional yeast is often used to add a cheesy flavor to recipes. Nutritional yeast can be found at most grocery stores, and since it’s shelf-stable, it can also be bought online. There are two types of nutritional yeast – fortified (with B12) and non-fortified (without B12) – either works for this recipe; personal preference!
• Garlic powder, basil, Italian seasoning, salt
• Soy Milk
• Vegan Parmesan – I used Follow Your Heart because it’s my fav!

Other

• Lasagna noodles – I used the kind that you pre-cook. If you’re going to use the ones you use dry, you may need to add more moisture/water to your sauce.
• Vegan mozzarella – I love Miyokos Liquid Mozzarella for this! It browns like real cheese!

Instructions

Butternut Squash Sauce

• Pre-heat the oven to 375 ºF (190 C).
• Dice the onion, mince the garlic (and cube the butternut squash if not frozen).
• In a bowl – mix together cubed butternut squash, onion, garlic, salt, Italian seasoning, sage.
• Cook in the oven for 25 – 30 minutes until fork tender.
• In a blender, combine the cooked butternut squash (and everything else you oven roasted), soy milk and white wine vinegar until well mixed and creamy.

Mushroom and Spinach Mixture

• Clean and chop mushrooms.
• In a medium-low heat pan, saute the mushrooms until most of the liquid is gone.
• Add in the white wine vinegar, salt and onion. Cook for another 5 minutes, stirring regularly to avoid burning/sticking.
• Add in garlic and saute for another 3- 5 minutes. Stir to avoid burning.
• Add in spinach last and cook until it looks like you only added in like five spinach leaves even though you had handfuls and handfuls of spinach!

Tofu Ricotta

• If you’re using extra firm tofu, make sure to press the tofu ahead of time.
• In a high powered food processor, mix tofu, nutritional yeast, soy milk, basil, garlic powder until well combined and paste-like (should be similar to ricotta).
• In a bowl, combine the ricotta mixture and vegan Parmesan.

Noodles

• Cook the noodles per package instructions.

Assembly

• Pre-heat the oven to 375 F (190 C).
• You will need a big Casserole dish – this is a lot of stuff!
• Spray the casserole dish with olive oil so that nothing sticks.
• Layer as follows:
  • Sauce
  • Noodles (should be three across)
  • Ricotta
  • Sauce
  • Mushroom/spinach
  • Noodles
  • Ricotta
  • Sauce
  • Mushroom/spinach
  • Noodles
  • Sauce
  • Mozzarella

Bake

• Cook for 40 – 50 minutes until cooked all the way through.

• I like to broil for a few minutes at the end to really brown the mozzarella.

Silly Little Haiku

Garfield’s favorite

Cats are known to like pasta

It is just science