macaroni and squash

John, who you might remember from bake club, just got back from getting his yoga teacher certification at Kripalu. In addition to all the amazing things he's said about the program, he also made sure to tell me I would have been blown away by the food. It basically sounds like he had a buffet of vegetarian ambrosia every day. When I pressed him for specific meal details all I could get out is that there was an incredible vegan macaroni and cheese that used squash as a replacement. So now that he's back, and willing to teach a class in my living room, I thought it would be fun to try and recreate the Kripalu Macaroni and Squash for our after-practice meal.

It took a bit of recipe hunting online to find something that sounded right. There are a lot of regular macaroni and cheese recipes that just add squash as an extra ingredient, and on the vegan side there seem to be two camps for the cream sauce replacement, either coconut milk or soy. After checking with Dawn, my vegan food adviser, I decided to go with the coconut and I think it was the right choice. I expected the flavor to be overly tropical (pina colada casserole? yuck!), but it actually blended in quite well. Most importantly John said it was a perfect match, and the large tupperware of leftovers I sent home with him was devoured in a couple days. You can't ask for a better review then that. James even wandered into the kitchen and admitted it smelled good before he realized it was squash.

ingredients:

1/2 box whole wheat pasta shells
1 medium sized butternut squash
1 15oz can coconut milk
1 large onion
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
salt, pepper, and dried sage to taste
breadcrumbs for crust

Peel squash and scrape seeds from inside. Chop into very small cubes.

In a large saucepan heat a couple tbs of olive oil to fry chopped onion until soft. Add squash, coconut milk, and spices. Cover and reduce heat to simmer for about 20-30 minutes.

As squash cooks mash up cubes with your spoon. You don't want it to be completely smooth, but the majority of the squash should be blended with the coconut milk sauce.

In a second pot, boil your pasta shells.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Add drained pasta shells to your squash pot (or a large mixing bowl if you don't have room, but I will do pretty much anything to avoid adding more dishes to wash later). Stir in walnuts.

Pour mixture into a medium sized casserole dish (9- x 13-inch). Sprinkle layer of breadcrumbs on top.

Bake for 30 minutes or until breadcrumbs get and crunchy and pasta is bubbling.

The side dish is blanched string beans tossed with a simple balsamic vinaigrette, dried cranberries and a little sprinkle of flax seeds.