I had said in a previous post that the popular girl of the squash family would get her own post, so here we are.
This weekend my husband was kind enough to actually join me in visiting a pumpkin farm. He asked if there would be anything exciting to do, and I said yes, we see pumpkins. I think we have a different view of what is exciting and what is not.
The pumpkin farm we went to visit was super cute, it had obviously a huge selection of different pumpkin families to choose from such as Hokkaido, butternut, spaghetti, Halloween pumpkins and so much more. Various where to cook from and others were just for decoration. A dream come true.
After I strolled through the pumpkin area and small section of local fruits and vegetables, we found a nice warm place to sit and I made my way towards the food stands. Everything was pumpkin inspired. They had pumpkin crepes, waffles, pizza, soup, breads and sweets, and my absolute favourite was the pumpkin prosecco. Quite peculiar but definitely worth a try.
This visit had me inspired to make something with pumpkin at home. I tend to see many sweet pumpkin recipes, and since my sweet tooth is salty, I thought of making something savoury. I really enjoy spinach and I think when added with cream its to die for. I wanted the pumpkin to be the focal point of the dish, so I really spiced it up. The spiced pumpkin with the creamy spinach meshed perfectly. This is not your traditional lasagne or pumpkin dish, but it did the trick. I will definitely be coming up with some more pumpkin treats within the next couple of weeks.
Pumpkin Spinach Cream Lasagne
1 Hokkaido pumpkin, de-seeded, peeled and chopped
2 red onions, finely diced
3 cloves garlic, finely diced
1 tbsp sumac
2 tsp ground nutmeg + 1 tsp for crème fraiche
2 tbsp olive oil
200g frozen spinach, thawed and excess water removed (double if fresh)
1/2 cup cream
200g crème fraiche
Lasagne sheets (about 9-12, depending on size of baking sheet)
2 mozzarella balls, sliced
200g shredded mozzarella (or cheese of your choice)
Salt and Pepper
In a large pan add olive oil. Add onions and garlic and simmer for about 3 minutes. Add pumpkin, sumac, nutmeg, salt and pepper and brown for about 5 minutes. Turn down the heat to medium low and continue to cook for approximately 10 minutes, or until the pumpkin is tender.
For the spinach cream, in a small pot add spinach, cream, salt and pepper and heat on medium low. Until well combined and heated. If you are using fresh spinach, continue to cook until the spinach has wilted completely.
Preheat the oven to 200 C.
In a small bowl combine crème fraiche and nutmeg and stir.
Grab a medium baking dish and add half of your crème fraiche mixture to the bottom of the baking dish. Add first layer of lasagne sheets. Add pumpkin mixture followed by spinach cream. Top it off with sliced mozzarella until fully covered. Continue this step until you have no more spinach cream, but about a spoonful or two of the pumpkin mixture. Last layer should be the second half of your nutmeg crème fraiche and the pumpkin mixture. Topped off with the shredded mozzarella.
Bake for 25 minutes, or until the cheese has turned golden brown.
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