Friday, 23 October 2015

Pumpkin Pork Lasagna


“Pumpkin Everythang”


And the nominees for most comforting food are (drum roll please) mac n cheese, fried chicken, soft baked chocolate chip cookies and none other but lasagna. Who would win that battle? I can say that if this pumpkin pork lasagna was in the running it would be a tight race. It’s loaded with flavor and cheesy, meaty goodness.

This beautiful tray of deliciousness as you can imagine went pretty fast. Cube after cube, slice after slice everyone kept coming back for more. I decided to experiment with the sauces and it worked out in my favor. I wanted a take on a white sauce using the pumpkins and some smoked sausages in addition to a red sauce using ground pork and my handy dandy Mushroom marinara sauce ( I still have two bags of this left in the freezer). 
 
I also took a chance and used some no-boil lasagna sheets. I have used them in the past and they just never worked out for me.  So over the years I continued to boil my lasagna sheets. However for this recipe I knew I had to try my luck again, because I was in no mood to deal with boiling pasta on film. I find using the boiled lasagna sheets in general to be super annoying. They are slippery, sometimes they stick together and rip ( ain’t nobody got time) . I am so glad I found a no boil lasagna pasta that worked for me, a brand called Tesco. All of a sudden Tesco products all bursting from the shelves of all the supermarket here… brand Jamaica??…no comment… In any case that was time saved. 



The only thing missing from this lasagna was ricotta for that added creaminess, grocery store was out. I vow that in the future I will make my own ricotta, it’s so easy I was just too lazy to do it for this recipe. You, my greedy guys and gals will never again hear me (or read me) saying that the store was out of ricotta so I didn’t use it, (here ends my ricotta rant). Other than that omission this lasagna takes home the prize.


NB.on a serious note I would highly recommend adding ricotta to this and every lasagna, it adds a nice layer of creaminess. You can add the ricotta on top of the pasta then add meat sauce and the mozzarella. You would need about ¾ to 1 cup per layer so it depends on how many layers your lasagna will have.

Ingredients

For the red sauce
1 tablespoon oil
¾ pound ground copper wood pork shoulder
¼ cup chopped onion
For the cream sauce
1 package of Copper wood pork smoked sausages
6 garlic cloves
1 onion
2 cups spinach
1 tablespoon oil
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup water
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
¼ teaspoon black pepper
2 cups chopped pumpkin
½ cup parmesan cheese
½ teaspoon salt
3-5 cups shredded Mozzarella cheese
1 box lasagna no boil pasta sheets






Greedy tips:

  • If you use the no boil pasta sheet make sure to cover completely with sauce and cheese and wrap tightly in foil, this allows the pasta to cook using steam and the moisture from the sauces.
  • Feel free to use the pasta that requires boiling, just follow the instructions on the box to do so.
Xoxo Greedygirl

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