Roasted Butternut Squash Hash with Mushrooms and Sausage

In my journey through the Autoimmune Protocol Elimination Diet, I became a lover of hash for breakfast. A hash is chopped meat that is cooked with chopped vegetables, usually potatoes. From freshly chopped veggies and meat to leftover vegetables from dinner the night before, hash is very versatile. You can make it from just about anything! This Roasted Butternut Squash Hash will use ground breakfast sausage for the meat and butternut squash, onions, mushrooms, and spinach for the vegetables.

Another perk to this hot breakfast, is it reheats well for another meal. Double it and have an easy, 5 minutes-to-the-table breakfast tomorrow!

This can be a one pot meal, but to minimizing cook time, I roasted the butternut squash and while the squash was roasting, I cooked the rest of the ingredients on the stove top. Total cook time is about 35 minutes, depending on how small the butternut squash is chopped. The smaller the chop, the shorter the cook time. My goal is to have my stove top items (sausage, onions, mushroom) finished cooking when the squash comes out of the oven. That way I just toss the squash in the pan with the sausage and veggies and wilt the spinach.

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When roasting the butternut squash, make sure to cook until the cubes are soft. A fork should be able to easily push into the cube. However, not so soft that the cubes turn to mush or fall apart when pierced with a fork. They should still hold their shape but not have any crunch in the middle.

There are two secrets to making this hash awesome: (1) brown the onions and mushrooms. Cook them longer than you think you need to. The flavor increase is significant. Take your time cooking these two ingredients. Here’s how I do it:

• Heat a cast iron pan over medium heat. Add 1 tablespoon of oil. When the oil is hot, add the onions. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions have released some moisture and are beginning to brown on the edges. If the edges of the onions start to blacken before sweating, the heat is too high, turn it down and keep going.
• Add the chopped mushrooms to the pan with the onions. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally until the mushrooms have released their moisture and are nice and brown. This will take at least 5-8 minutes, maybe more depending on how crowded your pan is.
• The onions should be very brown by this point, maybe even a little black. That’s ok! That color is FLAVOR!

Now you are ready to assemble the hash. Return the sausage to the pan along with the roasted butternut squash. Warm everything for a minute or so. Add the spinach. Sprinkle with salt and pepper then cook stirring, until wilted. Remove from heat to avoid overcooking the spinach.

My second tip for a killer hash: taste the dish before serving it! Add salt and pepper as needed. If the dish tastes flat or just unimpressive (this actually applies to almost anything you cook), it needs salt. Add a sprinkle, stir up the dish, let it sit for a minute, stir again and taste. Keep adjusting until it reaches your desired flavor.

The keys to making this Roasted Butternut Squash Hash great are (1) browning the onions and mushrooms and (2) tasting before serving. It takes a little extra time, but good tasting food always does. I promise the flavor is so worth it! If this is too time-consuming for breakfast, don’t sweat it! Make it for dinner! It is hearty and delicious for any meal of the day.

Wow, that was a lot of notes! Here’s the recipe! I hope you love it as much as I do!