Sausage Stuffed Butternut Squash

Stuffed Butternut Squash with Sausage and Apples - on a baking sheet.

Sausage Stuffed Butternut Squash

Stuffed Butternut Squash with Italian sausage, spinach, apples, and toasted pumpkin seeds is a fall-inspired weeknight meal that highlights the best of autumn’s produce, featuring winter squash, red and green apples, and toasted pumpkin seeds! It works well as a side or a main dish, and it’s gluten-free, dairy-free, and low-carb.

Course Main Course, Side Dish

Cuisine American

Keyword sausage stuffed butternut squash, stuffed butternut squash

Prep Time 20

Cook Time 40

Total Time 1

Servings people

Calories 723kcal

Author Julia

Ingredients

Roasted Butternut Squash

2 butternut squash medium or large
2 tablespoons olive oil
¼ teaspoon salt or more
freshly ground coarse black pepper

Sausage filling

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 small onion diced
14 oz Italian sausage spicy, crumbled
5 oz spinach fresh
2 large apples (1 green apple, 1 red apple cored and diced into small cubes)
½ cup pumpkin seeds toasted

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Roast the butternut squash

Preheat oven to 400 F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper for easy clean-up.
Prepare the butternut squash. Slice each one in half lengthwise. Keep fingers away from the knife to avoid injury. Use a spoon to scoop out the seeds and fleshy strands tangled with the seeds.
Place butternut squash cut sides up on a baking sheet. Drizzle the cut sides of the butternut squash halves with olive oil and rub the oil into the squash. Season generously with salt and pepper.
Turn the squash halves over, and place it cut sides down on a baking sheet.
Roast in the preheated oven at 400 F for 30 or 40 minutes.

Make sausage and apple filling

Make the sausage filling while the squash is being roasted in the oven.
In a large skillet, heat olive oil, add diced onion, and cook it on medium-high heat for about 2 minutes until cooked.
Add the crumbled sausage and cook for 5 minutes or more on medium heat until it is completely cooked through.
Add fresh spinach and cook briefly on medium heat until the spinach wilts.
Add the diced apples and stir everything together, cooking for a few minutes until the apples are heated through.
Season with salt and pepper. Probably not necessary since the sausage is already usually salty.

Assembly

By this time, you have roasted the butternut squash for 30 or 40 minutes. Remove them from the oven and turn the cooked squash halves cut sides up.
Let it cool slightly. Using a spoon, scoop out the flesh, leaving about a 1-inch border along the sides. (For reference, I provide the step-by-step photos for this step above the recipe card). Add the scooped-out squash back into the largest cavities and press it down.
Reheat the sausage mixture in the same skillet you made it in to warm it up.
Divide the sausage filling among the 4 halves and stuff the squash until the mixture is leveled or a little bit higher.
Top with toasted pumpkin seeds and serve.

Nutrition