Butternut Squash and Sage Spaghetti

The thing I love best about cooking is that you can pretty easily substitute similar ingredients to use whatever you have on hand. For example, I had a butternut squash sitting around and a ton of sage in my garden. I knew I had seen a recipe using sage and pumpkin in one of my cookbooks, so after a quick search I found this recipe in Donna Hay's Off the Shelf: Cooking from the Pantry. I used the squash in place of the pumpkin, and spaghetti instead of pappardelle, and voila! Butternut Squash and Sage Spaghetti...

Ingredients

2 lbs. butternut squash, peeled and diced

olive oil

2 1/2 oz. butter

3 tablespoons whole sage leaves

1 cup grated parmesan cheese

cracked black pepper and sea salt

14 oz. spaghetti

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 F. Place the squash in a baking dish and sprinkle with olive oil. Bake for 30 minutes or until tender.

Cook the pasta in a large pot of boiling water until al dente. Drain.

While the pasta is cooking, place the butter and sage in a saucepan over low to medium heat and allow the butter to simmer until golden brown.

To serve, place the pasta on serving dishes and top with the squash and parmesan. Spoon over the brown butter and sage leaves and season with salt and pepper. Serves 4.