Roasted Pumpkin Lasagna with Butter Beans

Piping hot and bubbly out from the oven, it looks "alive".

This recipe uses two ingredients that I don't normally cook with: 1. carrot - I'm ok with carrot, I just don't give much thought about cooking or eating them; 2. celery - I'm better with celery now than when I was a kid. There's this other issue with celery: they come in big packages - I don't want to be thinking what to cook with celery for 7 consecutive meals. So it's not hard to see this is a combination that I'd usually avoid. It's probably the frozen cooked butter beans that called me to this recipe, which ironically plays no part in the original recipe.

I kind of messed up the part with the roasted pumpkin and cooked butter beans. The original instruction is "Clear a spot in the bottom of the pan and add the chopped roasted butternut squash and about 1/4 of the beans with their liquid. Mash the two together with a potato masher or the back of a spoon, and then add the rest of the beans to the pot." I didn't de-froze the beans fast enough (I forgot we now have a microwave). I also think butter beans are not as easily mashed as canned cannelini beans. Therefore, after some considerable futile attempts, the butter beans remained mostly "unharmed" and intact in my recipe.

The lasagna noodle recipes that I found online seem pretty strict forward. I'm not a pasta person or I wouldn't mind investing in one of those pasta maker and make my own noodles.

I'm glad I didn't reduce the recipe and made what's enough for 6 persons. Adrian did have a little comment "look like we'll be having lasagna for a few more dinners." When I said we could give it away, he looked surprised "give it away? WHY?" Yes, the lasagna is G.O.O.D.

For the filling:

• 1/2 a large pumpkin, roasted with olive oil, salt and black pepper. Mashed.
  
• 2 carrots, peeled and diced
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 stalks celery, diced
• 6 cloves garlic, minced
• small bunch of fresh thyme, leaves picked and chopped
• small bunch of fresh oregano, leaves picked and chopped
• 2 big handful of cooked butter beans
  
• 1/4 cup white vinegar
  
• salt and pepper

1. Saute onions with salt. Add celery and carrots. Stir to coat. Cover and let cook over medium heat for 10 minutes.
   
2. Stir in thyme and oregano. Stir to coat. Cover and let cook for another 5 minutes.
   
3. Stir in garlic and fry till fragrant.
4. Add cooked butter beans and mashed roasted pumpkin.
   
5. Deglaze with white vinegar. Add some water to thin it out if necessary. Season with salt and pepper.
   

For the béchamel:

• 5 Tbsp butter
• 1/4 cup flour
• 3 cups milk, heated
  
• 2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp grated nutmeg

1. Melt butter over medium heat. Whisk in flour. Continue to whisk until the mixture turns golden brown (about 6 - 7 minutes).
2. Add heated milk, one cup at a time, stirring constantly until the mixture is smooth.
   
3. Bring it to boil and cook for another 30 seconds. Season with salt and nutmeg.

To assemble:

• filling
• bechamel sauce (set aside 1 cup for topping)
  
• 4 oz. of mozzarella cheese
• 3 oz. of ricotta cheese
• Lasagna noodles
  

1. Preheat oven to 180C. Grease a 10cm x 20cm Pyrex baking dish with butter. Mix together mozzarella and ricotta. Set aside 1/4 cup.
2. Layer from the bottom in this order: bechamel, lasagna sheet, filling, and cheese. Repeat as many times as necessary. End with 1 cup of bechamel sauce and sprinkle the top with 1/4 cup of cheese.
3. Bake in the oven for 45 minutes, until golden brown and bubbly. Cool before serving.
   

Roasted Garlic and Bell Pepper Pizza

Before Adrian left home, I told him we were having pizza for dinner - it's my way of saying "have-anything-in-between-as-long-as-it's-not-the-same-as-dinner". He came home, told me he watched the guy tossed pizza at the Food Loft. He may have guessed I was trusting him with the crust rolling responsibility. Look what he did. Instead of the conventional circle, he made a country map. Australia?

Look aside, it's a good pizza. I prepared most of the ingredients a day ahead. It was all about putting things together come dinner time. You can use store bought sun-dried tomatoes instead of roasting your own. I just wanted to make sure those cherry tomatoes went for good use before they turned bad.

I loved the smell of the garlic as it was roasting. It kind of became obscure when mashed into paste with the roasted tomatoes. It was fun squeezing them out of the garlic cloves; they were so soft I didn't even have to use blender - just a few good mash. If I ever make this again, I'd be sure to use more onions: it didn't matter when I wasn't aware of it, but once I tasted how good it was, I wished there were more in every bite.

Ingredients:

• 1 pizza crust
  
• 1 head garlic, unpeeled, head sliced
  
• 1 yellow onion, sliced into rings
• olive oil
• 1/2 cup Oven-roasted herbed cherry tomatoes
• 1 roasted red bell pepper, cut into strips
  
• 6 ounces Mozzarella, grated
• 2 1/2 ounce Feta, crumbled
  
• 2 tablespoons parsley, chopped
• 4 tablespoons basil, chopped

1. Preheat oven to 150C. Place garlic onto a baking dish and drizzle with one tablespoon of olive oil. Place onion rings to a separate baking dish and coat with one tablespoon of olive oil. Bake in the oven until garlic is brown and soft; onions are tender - about 45 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool.
2. Set oven to 250C. Using fingers, squeeze out roasted garlic cloves into a bowl; add tomatoes and mash into paste. Set aside.
3. Roll out pizza crust. Spread garlic paste evenly over crust. Layer with onions, bell pepper, Mozzarella and feta. Sprinkle with 1 tablespoons parsley and 2 tablespoons basil. Bake for 10 minutes; until cheeses turn golden brown and bubbly.
   
4. Remove from oven, top with the remaining parsley and basil.
   

Roasted Tomato Caprese on Parmesan Polenta Fries

I'm not a big fan of caprese but I thought caprese with roasted tomato sounds tasteful. Instead of using pre-made polenta log as the recipe does, I substituted it with a recipe for Parmesan Polenta Fries. I was so proud of how these came out - they were truly delicious! Roasting the tomatoes adds so much flavor, and stacking everything on top of the polenta makes for a beautiful presentation. Not to forget the yummy-licious garlic mayo dip! This is the way Adrian describes it "it reminds me of fast foods - it gives the same kind of guilty pleasure of eating fast food except it's not sinful". That should summarize how delicious this is.

Polenta Crust

• 1/2 cup uncooked polenta
• 1/2 cup of water
• 1 cups of milk
• juice and zest of 1/2 lemon
• 1/4 cup of chopped herb of your choice (I used fresh basil, thyme and oregano)
• salt and pepper
• 2 oz. butter (optional)
• 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese (grated)

1. In a saucepan, bring water and milk to a boil. Stir in polenta and reduce heat to low. Let cook while stirring constantly.
2. Add lemon juice and zest, herbs, butter and Parmesan.
   
3. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Line a 8x8" baking pan with parchment paper. Layer polenta mixture evenly over the bottom. Let cool for about 5 minutes and transfer to freezer for at least two hours (I left it overnight).

1. Preheat oven to 200C. Take the pan out from the freezer and remove the parchment paper. You can either cut polenta into 1.5" strips (like fries) or into 4 squares (as I did).

1. Lay parchment paper over a baking sheet. Place the polenta strips or squares on the sheet and brush with melted butter.
2. Bake in the oven for about 20-30 minutes or until golden brown, turn once and continue to bake. Remove from the oven, sprinkle with a little salt & pepper.

Garlic Mayo Spread:

• 1/4 c. Japanese mayonnaise
• 1 garlic glove, minced
• 1 tbsp. lemon juice
• dash of Tabasco sauce and Tonkatsu
  
• salt and pepper
• Herbs (optional. I used spring onion, thyme, oregano and parsley)
  

Mix all ingredients and serve as dipping for fries or spread over Polenta squares as you would for burger or sandwiches.

For the Caprese:

• 1 large roma tomatoes, sliced
  
• 2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
• 1 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
• 1 large garlic cloves, minced
• 1/2 teaspoons sugar
• sea salt and pepper
• 4 ounces fresh mozzarella, sliced
  
• 4-5 fresh basil leaves
  

1. Arrange tomato slices in one single layer on a sheet pan. Drizzle with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Sprinkle with the garlic, sugar, salt, and pepper. Roast for 1 hour until the tomatoes are concentrated and begin to caramelize. Allow the tomatoes to cool to room temperature.
2. Place polenta squares onto plates. Spread garlic mayo over the top and stack each squares with tomato slices, fresh mozzarella and basil leaves. Serve at room temperature.
   

Tomato Mozzarella Basil Tart

It came out nicely browned.

I bought rice for this recipe. Why? Because I don't have baking beads and do not know where to buy them. Besides, I was told by a professional baker it was not necessary to use baking beads. Beans and rice would suffice. Hence, I bought the cheapest, smallest package available on the shelf. Sorry, no organic, no whole wheat, no brown rice.

As with my previous recipes (with cream cheese, with pesto), this dough, too, is flavored. This time with garlic and basil. The recipe is pretty straight forward. I substituted 1/4 C of unbleached all purpose flour with whole wheat flour for a more crunchy crust.

The basil topping enhances the garlicky basil crust.


Love the oozy melty cheese.