There’s this squash casserole I used to have that I’ll never forget. It was sooooo good, creamy, and decadent but topped off with Ritz Crackers. Thankfully, I don’t have to consume those nasty little suckers filled with trans fatty cottonseed oil, high fructose corn syrup, refined flour, GMOs and a bunch of other ingredients that don’t belong in my body anymore. I’ve recreated this southern masterpiece just in time for summer when squash is coming out the wazoo! I hope your family enjoys this dish as much as we do – it’s so hard not to eat the whole pan in one sitting. Please don’t say I didn’t warn ya!
Most breadcrumbs are painfully full of additives too, so instead of buying them, I make my own using Food For Life “Ezekiel” bread. If you don’t have that kind of bread at home, feel free to use any good quality bread you have access to and follow the same instructions in the notes section of this recipe below. You could even use crushed up Mary’s Gone Crackers as a replacement if you are gluten free.
- 1 tablespoon coconut oil
- ½ yellow onion, diced
- 3 cups sliced yellow squash
- 1 egg
- ½ cup goat cheese or grated cheddar (alternative: cashew cheese)
- ½ cup almond milk or dairy milk
- ⅛ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- ¼ teaspoon sea salt and freshly ground pepper
- 1 cup Ezekiel breadcrumbs*
- 2 tablespoons fresh chopped parsley
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
- Heat the oil in a saute pan over medium heat. Add the onion and squash and cook for 4-5 minutes.
- In a bowl, whisk together the egg, cheese, milk, cayenne and salt and pepper.
- Place the squash mix in a casserole dish and top with the egg mixture. Sprinkle the Ezekiel breadcrumbs on top and place in the oven for 25-30 minutes. To serve, top with some fresh parsley. Enjoy!
**Please choose all organic ingredients if possible**
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If you know someone who loves summer squash – please share this recipe with them, who knows maybe they’ll whip this up for ya!
Xo,
Vani
I use a greek spice Cavenders Greek Seasoning -no MSG in many recipes for unique taste ……was reading that many green and yellow squash are now GMO so look for organic .
Yes – definitely purchase organic squash – very important 🙂
Wow food babe, this looks great!! I mean, in my family we definitely use Ritz crackers on a casserole with beans & corn that we affectionately call S.L.O.P. Please don’t ask what that stands for. My wife always feels SO guilty because we are asked to bring this at every family gathering and we never eat it ourselves because we know just how bad it is for you. Now we can bring this AND eat it.
The fifth ingredient in my Cavender’s Greek Seasoning is MSG. I emptied it and made a copy cat version of it.
Can you please list your ingredients for the copy cat version?
Here is my copy cat version of Cavender’s Greek Seasoning:
2 1/2 t. salt, 2 t. ground black pepper, 2 t. organic cornstarch,
2 t. garlic powder, 2 t. oregano, 1/2 t. sugar,
1 1/2 t. onion powder, 1 t. parsley, 1/2 t. dried basil,
1/2 t. thyme, 1 t. dill, 1 t. marjoram, 1 t. rosemary,
1/2 t. cinnamon., 1/2 t. nutmeg
Grind all except the salt and pepper and store in a glass jar.
I used all organic ingredients. Every time I use it, no one can tell the difference.
My son thinks he has to have Cavender’s so I emptied the container and filled
it with my blend and he doesn’t know it to this day. He thinks he’s using Cavender’s.
The whole non-gmo, organic, natural thing is so important. It just sucks that you’re still into killing animals and eating chicken periods. There is no “kind” or healthy way to kill and eat an animal for it’s meat 🙁
What is a good substitute for the egg?
Try organic coconut milk.
Flaxseed meal + water will make a good egg substitute. My nieces are allergic to eggs so this is how I make them baked things.
1 tbsp flaxseed meal
3 tbsp water
Combine flaxseed meal and water and allow to sit for about 5 minutes. Add this ingredient to your recipe as you would the eggs.
EnerG makes a good egg replacement, you just add a little water to the powder. And I have read that you can use chia seeds as an egg replacement, haven’t tried it yet but Im curious. Try googling it, am sure you will find the info!
Plants can sense danger and try to protect themselves. They also can alert each other about threats and stuff. They get killed and eaten too. Just saying!
Just got one of my 5 deer I harvested back from the butcher. Fried and crumbled up 1 pound of fresh sausage in the mix. I get my sausage made with no added fat.. The coconut oil really cleans up the gamee taste in the venision. I also diced the squash before cooking. OMG ! THIS IS GOOD. This is what God has given us and I say Thanks for providing me with the resources to provide for my family. And thank you Food Babe for a great recipe.
Just got one of my 5 deer back from the butcher. Fried and crumbled up 1 pound of sausage in the mix. I get my sausage made with no added fat.. The coconut oil really cleans up the gamee taste in the venision. I also diced the squash before cooking. OMG ! THIS IS GOOD. This is what God has given us and I say Thanks for providing me with the resources to provide for my family. And thank you Food Babe for a great recipe.
Yum Yum…
Oooh Vani, I’m going to rate this five stars because I KNOW it will be scrumptious. Will make it over the weekend. Thank you!
I understand your sentiment about there doesn’t seem to be any “kindness” in killing, and I don’t think I could kill and butcher an animal. But when I’m preparing a meal, I wonder if chopping up and eating a living carrot, which if put back in the ground would continue growing, is any different than cutting up an animal. Is it because plants cannot scream, so their deaths are seen as acceptable?
Plants aren’t conscious, ambulatory creatures with brains and central nervous systems. I am against the commodification, poor treatment, and suffering of animals. I am doing less harm to our ecosystem, and to animals by not consuming them, and even if it does seem hypocritical to you, I am making efforts to be a better, more humane person. Not to mention my nutrients aren’t being filtered through another sentient being’s body, I’m getting mine straight from the source.
You don’t have to be ambulatory to have consciousness. Plants ARE conscious! This has been proven, many times, in many repeatable experiments, by the same man who invented the lie detector, Clive Baxter. You can Google him and/or read his books and/ or watch some videos on Youtube. There are many. One, the “Singing Plants of Damanhur” is very captivating. This gives one to pause and ponder the main reason to give thanks at the dinner table. It is to thank the plants that gave you their lives so you can be nourished. David Wilcock, (Gaiam TV & Youtube & DivineCosmos.com) also explains this very well.
How would you consider an egg to be conscious then? … I get it , you think that the egg industry would be contributing to animal suffering… but even the free range organic ones? Taylor Y. could take it even a very very small step further and say that rocks have a consciousness because some of them align with the earths magnetic poles and/or there are “live” spinning elections “dancing” about the nucleus in the atoms of a rock… hmmm, some peeps even have pet rocks!
So you would have animals reproduce freely until they are so over-populated there is not enough food for them? So over-populated that they are spreading disease to innocent little children? Really? Like the beautiful deer in this country which people have pretty much stopped hunting, which 100 years ago had an approximate population in this country of 500,000 and now have a population of about 30 million, animal populations left unchecked result in starvation. You’re not seeing wild deer on the roads because “humans have encroached on their habitat.” You’re seeing them because they are so seriously over-populated that they are coming out of the woods into our yards to graze.The sick and weak ones are not being culled and are, therefore, weakening the herds. The deer are also spreading that nasty little deer tick that carries Borrelia borgdorferi (Lyme disease) and its co-infections, and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, diseases which are now all over the US, not just in Connecticut … disease which kill people Many people, including ME, are getting Lyme and suffering for years before it is identified, and many Lyme victims are little children. Lyme is incurable, though I have to say I have been blessed to find a doctor who is getting me well. Still, the only way to know if you are Lyme free is through an autopsy, so I’ll never know if I’m well or not. Antibiotics do not work against Lyme because Lyme can hide from the immune system. It can go dormant for years, then revive and wreak havoc again. People say, “how can you kill Bambi?” Having had Lyme, let me tell you, I have no problem killing Bambi! It is absolutely imperative that we control animal populations both for their good and ours. I’m always amazed that vegetarians or “vegans” are so compassionate toward animals but never seem to be upset about the 56 million human babies that have been aborted. God calls that murder, but He said we would have to eat animals. It’s dangerous when you come to worship the creature more than the Creator.
SpiritualVegan, to educate myself on this statement I researched and found that there is ample proof that plants DO have consciousness and central nervous systems. Google “The Baxter Effect”. The answer to How to eat spiritually and consciously is to thank all food prior to consumption for giving its life for your nutrition. All consciousness truly wants to be “of service” if treated humanely and with awareness of its “service”. My 2 cents.
K C, what do you propose we eat if we shouldn’t kill animals or plants for nutrition?
Your are a genius! I too am IN LOVE with a good corn or squash (or both) casserole but haven’t made it in several years because, well, it’s pretty bad for you! I never had time to play with the recipe like this so thanks so much for doing so!!! I’m making this tomorrow to go with our family dinner!
Thank you Vani, for all that you do and for all the great recipes!! I hate to be a wet blanket here, (my Mom calls me a “buzz kill”) but I have recently learned that even if bread (if made with wheat) is organic, sprouted, non-GMO, that it is still bad for you. Wheat, according to top whistleblowers, has been weaponized as well as refined sugar. This happened a decade or so ago. They have inserted a “protein” of some kind that is poisonous to us. “They” have their complex agenda, but basically, by “slow killing” us, they hope to keep us working until around age 50, then we start succumbing to all the poisons and start getting sick and going to the doctor (more money for them) and die before we are 65, so as to keep us from getting our Social Security benefits. Just one moe aspect of “their” depopulation agenda, so they make a lot of money, on our way to an early grave, without having to to pay out (what is NOT there) the taxes they have stolen from us all our working lives. Just FYI >>
What happened to my last, thoughtfully written, post?
i use organic 12 grain bread from Costco. Can that work instead of Ezekial bread?
I would love to be able to print out your squash recipe but the last time I tried my printer printed about 6 or 7 pages of all the comments with followed the recipe.
Can’t you have the recipe portion of your post separate from all the extra material?
Did you try the print recipe link?
Here’s the link in case you don’t see it : https://foodbabe.com/easyrecipe-print/21888-0/
can hemp milk be used instead of almond milk?
The ingredients look great but as a frugal senior in a top floor apartment that gets to the high 8O’s in the summer, I try to avoid heating up my big oven to avoid the electricity bill for my AC and the stove, preferring to cook things stove top. Carefully done adding the beaten egg near the end of the squash, onion saute in the coconut oil and the cheese or cashews and crumbs at the very end, I believe it would still turn out well. I’ll try it with some giant zucchini left at my doorstep.
Asian cooking is yummy – mostly all done without ovens.
Stay cool my friend!
I have been looking for a healthy squash casserole recipe! Thank you for posting – perfect timing!! Looks yummy 🙂
Agree – I am drowning in squash right now thanks to the wet summer here in Kentucky.
Thanks for a healthy alternative!
This thread is supposed to be about this recipe, (which is meat free by the way) not an argument between meat eaters and vegetarians. Seriously, unless you live under a rock …we’ve all heard just about all of the arguments there are to have on that subject anyway. Your not going to change anyone, do your own thing and live by example instead of living out of anger….you just may get better results!
Agreed, arguing is not productive. It just lowers your vibrational level. But guess what else does? Eating meat. It is considered “grounding”. Think about why that might be. As many (though not all) who are interested in healthier eating are also interested in spiritual growth and enlightenment, eating a plant-based diet (which raises your vibrational level) would be a wise move. Anyone who is paying attention at all(admittedly, not everyone is) would naturally have an interest in spiritual evolution. Spiritualvegan is simply spreading the word, in the hopes that those are ready will hear. Those that aren’t will simply argue.
I understand the concept of grounding. I do energy work and I ground myself energetically before each session. Grounding can be a good thing when needed, not bad! Though too much of anything is bad, and if you look at it that way and your diet is too high in meat then that can become an imbalance and too much grounding can occur. I personally eat however my body seems to be telling me at that moment. I have digestive issues right now, so I am not eating meat, only fish and veggies. Another time when the digestive fires are stronger I may eat meat again, but in limited quantities if I do at all. Thanks for your thoughtful reply!
This recipe sounds delicious, especially since I have a garden & lots of squash. When I have a recipe that calls for those “suckers” or other type breads, I just add extra grated cheese on top. It’s pretty with the melted cheese too!
I love Vani’s recipes!
In the oven now! Will report back. Impossible to find organic squash around where I live and no garden this year. I did olive oil and butter instead of coconut oil, used romano from Italy(the real stuff),and some organic valley cheese slices that were getting hard,organic Valley Milk and no soy eggs from WI. We shall see! My concerns are the butter, not organic or grass fed. And the olive oil, it’s a nice brand from Greece but there is so much fake oil these days I am leery. I wish makers were more ethics driven then profit driven.
I’ve never used coconut oil before. Planned to buy some but was overwhelmed with all the varieties. Can you offer any tips on what to purchase?
How do you come up with all these wonderful recipes.
This was great! I did 1/2 goat cheese and 1/2 cheddar cheese. I might add a little crushed red pepper to it next time. I didn’t have any parsley so I skipped it this time, and I had Ian’s Whole Wheat Panko bread crumbs on hand. Yummy!
Hi,
I know this isn’t exactly the right place to ask this question, but what is the best type of flour to buy to keep at home when I need it for a recipe? I have you audio book and I remember it talked about what to look for, but I can’t remember, and didn’t want to spend a long time searching through all of the cds 🙂
Thanks!
I have a question: I recently discovered that most Ezekiel bread contains SOY BEANS. I usually try to avoid soy. Is this still safe to use?
Hi all, I just made this and it was delish! I used nutiva red palm oil instead of coconut, because i love the flavor, and added some fresh garlic in with the squash and onions. I also added a little bit of organic mayo to the milk/cheese/egg because that’s the way my mom always made posh squash and it gave it such a nice savory flavor. I decided to crush up some ak mak crackers along with a few cheddar bunnies for the topping, and it came out pretty darn amazing if I do say so myself 🙂 Happy cooking!
What size casserole dish do you use. We liked the casserole but it seemed like a ton of bread crumbs on top so I am thinking I should have used a larger size dish or one of different dimensions. I used an 8 1/2 x 7 in, 3 inch high.
I added fresh Ham cubes to this recipe. Mmm Good.. Organic of course.. If Meat was not put here for us to eat, Please tell us why it tastes SO GOOD !
Thanh you Food Babe.
Just got one of my deer back from the butcher. Fried and crumbled up 1 pound of sausage in the mix. I get my sausage made with no added fat.. The coconut oil really cleans up the gamee taste in the venision. I also diced the squash before cooking. OMG ! THIS IS GOOD. This is what God has given us and I say Thanks for providing me with the resources to provide for my family. And thank you Food Babe for a great recipe.
I have tried several of your recipes that came out great. Not so much for this one though. The flavor was good but it was a little dry. I cut back on the breadcrumbs and it was still way too much bread.
I didn’t see onion listed as an ingredient list??? But it says to sauté it first in the instruction…. how much onion in the summer squash casserole recipe?
Thanks!
Never mind the above ….. my bad! Sorry! Just overlooked! I should always double check myself!!!
Oh my goodness, this is so good!! This is the first Food Babe recipe I have ever made. My mom asked if I would make this for a small, outdoor 4th of July dinner with her. I made this because she asked me, I had no idea I would enjoy yellow squash so much! I was seriously craving this again today and still had one more yellow squash, yay! This is in the oven again for dinner tonight. Wow, Vani, thank you for such a simple and delicious recipe!