Creamy Butternut Squash & Honey Garlic Sausage Pasta Bake Casserole

Visually impaired home cook Yolanda shares her recipe for her Creamy Butternut Squash & Honey Garlic Sausage Pasta Bake Casserole recipe.
Special thank you to Grenville Pinto for the use of his amazing violin music for our introductions. Check out his awesome webpage at @gpintoviolin
Ingredients:
2 to 3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
1 medium sweet white onion coarsely chopped
1 stalk of celery coarsely chopped
1 medium tomato or 4 large cherry tomatoes coarsely chopped
2 garlic cloves halved
750 grams of frozen butternut squash or 2 large fresh butternut squash peeled and cubed
1 bay leaf
1 cube of vegetable bouillon
1 cup of white wine
2 cups of water
4 to 5 medium honey garlic sausages casing removed, crumbled and cooked
1 green onion finely chopped
6 ounces of light 5% cream
1 cup of shredded mozzarella cheese
½ cup of grated Parmigiano cheese
1 package of rigatoni pasta (454 grams)
½ cup of seasoned bread crumbs
Salt & pepper to taste
Directions:
Remove casing from sausages, crumble meat with fingers and brown until cooked through. Add green
onion, mix and set aside.
In a large skillet heat olive oil, add white onions, celery, tomatoes & garlic. Sautee for 3 minutes or until
slightly softened. Season with salt & pepper. Add in the frozen butternut squash and mix well. Add in
the white wine and mix well. Cook for about 2 minutes. Crumble in the vegetable bouillon cube. Add
the water and the bay leaf. Mix well and bring to a simmer. Cover with a lid and cook for about 20
minutes. Cool well and remove the bay leaf; ladle mixture into a blender and blend until smooth and
creamy. Pour into a large mixing bowl. Add in the light cream and mix well. Set aside.
In a large pot of salted water, cook pasta for about 6 minutes. You will be cooking the pasta only half
way through as you will finish the cooking process afterwards in the oven. Drain the pasta after 6
minutes and pour into the pureed butternut sauce mixture. Mix well and coat pasta with the butternut
sauce. Add the mozzarella cheese reserving some for the topping. Add the crumbled cooked sausage
and mix well. Add the Parmigiano cheese reserving some for the topping. Taste and adjust the pasta
dish with salt & pepper to your liking. Pour the mixture into a glass casserole dish sprayed with non-
stick cooking spray.
With a spatula make sure pasta is spread evenly in the casserole dish. Sprinkle remaining shredded
mozzarella cheese, Parmigiano cheese and breadcrumbs all over the top. Cover with foil wrap sprayed
with non-stick cooking spray so that topping will not stick to the foil. Bake in a preheated 400 F. oven
for 20 minutes. Uncover and bake in oven for additional 10 minutes until top has browned and is crusty.
Serve with a slice of garlic bread and enjoy piping hot!