Roasted Butternut, Carmelized Onion and Apple Maple Sausage Pizza

I don't plan meals before I go shopping. I prefer wandering around the store, getting my cooking staples and then picking up whatever else appeals to me. (I actually love to go grocery shopping.) Its funny to me how the random ingredients I buy always wind up working together. Two of those things from my last trip were a butternut squash and apple maple chicken sausage.

As I was browsing for inspiration for how to use my butternut squash in a different way, I kept coming across pizzas. None of them had meat, but I knew Sage would like a squash pizza better if it had the sausage on it. I was thinking goat cheese at first, but lots of the recipes I saw had ricotta, so I went with that since I had some to use up. Plus I always love ricotta on a pizza. I was going to have Sage bring home some sage (yes, really) but I forgot, so I used dried thyme instead. I got a later start on dinner, so I used a quick rise dough. It was good, but I didn't turn the oven up enough after roasting the squash, so it took a really long time to cook through. This was time consuming (but I believe I need to work on my time management skills in the kitchen) but wonderful!

pizza dough ball or premade crust (I used this recipe subbing 1 tbsp of honey for the sugar and 1/2 a cup of the flour using whole wheat and letting it rise once for a 30 minutes.)

1 small butternut squash, peeled and cut into 1/2 in. cubes

olive oil

1 small onion, sliced

1 tbsp butter

1/2 cup part-skim ricotta

2 links (pre-cooked) apple maple chicken sausage, thinly sliced

1 tbsp shredded parmesan

1 tsp dried thyme

1. Heat butter in skillet over medium heat. Add onion and cook until beginning to brown. Reduce heat to low and cook until carmelized (about 45 minutes) stirring frequently. Lay on a paper towel until ready to use.

2. Toss squash in enough olive oil to lightly coat, and roast in an oven preheated to 350 degrees for about 40 minutes. Set aside.

3. Roll out crust into desire shape. Transfer to pizza pan or cookie sheet and precook for 5 minutes. Brush with olive oil, and top with about a cup of the roasted butternut (reserve any extra for another use.) Layer sausage and onion. Drop small clumps of ricotta evenly and sprinkle with parmesan and thyme.

4. Bake according to pizza dough recipe, or until crust is golden brown and sauage is warmed through.