When the weather starts to cool down and summer dwindles, I’ll find myself looking forward to autumn. I spend my summers on the Croatian coast these days, and just after the US Labor Day in early September, I’m starting to look forward to all the autumnal recipes, including the butternut blue cheese lasagna that I created while living in Eastbourne, UK, after getting back from a charming cozy autumn in Tuscany back in 2017.
I’m a fusion girl. I grew up in Belize and spent my summers in the US. My grandfather and uncle were chefs. I loved food, flavors, and combinations, so I was destined to break traditions by adding what did not belong.
I was raised by American parents, a mother who taught me that lasagna was made with ricotta, and how the Tuscans in Livorno gasped when I told them how I make lasagna with ricotta. They were appalled! Bechamel, they exclaimed! Well, after a lovely autumn in Tuscany, I headed back to the UK, where I started thinking. So much sage and so much butternut! Thankfully, they go lovely together, but what if I created a lasagna with bechamel, of course, and butternut and sage? Then, some extra Stilton in the fridge tempted my curiosity to add the blue cheese crumbled above the layer of smooth bechamel.
Ingredients
4 sausages
6 mushrooms
Sliced butternut for the bottom
Diced butternut to caramelize with sausage and a splash of Sherry wine
Cook mushrooms with thyme
Béchamel add 1/3 cup of blue cheese (your preference)
Brown the sausage and mushrooms, add diced sage, diced butternut, and a splash of sherry wine, and set aside. Prepare a béchamel. Then, layer uncooked lasagna with the bechamel, thin slices of butternut, the mixture, and another layer of lasagna, and again until you reach the top of your baking dish. Crumble some blue cheese on top and bake until the kitchen smells ready to eat.
