Pasta with Roasted Butternut Squash

Yes, we are in a snow covered cottage in the country. It's picturesque and serene, but also miles away from a store or a place to eat. We have a car, but around these parts everything closed at about 4 PM. I realized we didn't have anything planned for Christmas Eve dinner, so we had to make do with what we had in the house. Luckily A Good Appetite came to the rescue.

We didn't have all the ingredients, so some some adjustments were required from the original recipe.

Ingredients

Medium butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cut into 1 inch squares

Nutmeg

Basil

Vegetable Oil

1/4 cup unsalted butter

salt

pepper

fusilli pasta

2 ounces goat cheese

3 cloves crushed garlic

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Prepare the squash and place it in a large pan. Drizzle a small amount of oil, add the garlic, salt, pepper, basil and nutmeg to taste. Stir with a large spoon and place uncovered in the oven.

Roast the squash for about 30 minutes, checking ever few minutes and stirring as needed. (Now, at this point, I turned off the oven, left for the airport, picked up my mom, returned and turned the oven back on long enough to reheat the squash. But you can skip this step.)

When the squash has about 10 minutes left, start cooking the pasta.

In a separate small saucepan, heat the butter on medium heat until it starts to turn brown, but don't let it burn. Remove from heat and add some salt and nutmeg.

Drain the pasta when it is al dente and remove the squash from the oven. Add the pasta to the squash. (If you have a health conscious brother staying with you, this is the part where he takes his serving.) Add the butter and crumble the cheese into the pasta and squash, mix thoroughly and serve. Leftovers can be refrigerated and reheated.