Easy Roasted Acorn Squash

On a note completely unrelated to the contents of this post: This blog's Facebook page finally has enough people "liking" it that I could assign it an actual username!  This is pretty exciting for me.  Ahh, the little things in life...  At any rate, if you use Facebook and get some enjoyment/amusement out of reading this blog, please swing by http://www.facebook.com/HeyWhoCutTheCheese and "like" the page if you haven't already.  Thanks!


Now, to the recipe.  I love squash.  Butternut, spaghetti, acorn, pumpkin (hello?! my family had to plead with me to stop making pumpkin-based recipes)...  you name it; I'll likely eat it.  In addition to them being pretty delicious, it's nice to be able to eat foods that are in season.  Not that I adhere to this principle really strictly, but it's still nice.


Recipes like this can be found all over the place, but you can use this recipe as a template if you'd like.  I don't really use any strict measurements, so feel free to play with it until you arrive at something you like.


You'll need:


1 acorn squash, halved with seeds and guts scooped out
~1 butter
~1-2 tbs brown sugar
maple syrup
salt


Start by preheating your oven to 400 degrees F.


This is an acorn squash.

It can be prepared in a variety of ways, but I find that peeling it can be a little tedious, so I always just slice it in half.  

Scrape out the seeds and discard them.  Or keep them and roast them like you would pumpkin seeds.  


Score the flesh of the squash with a knife, being careful to not cut the whole way through.  Spread some butter on each of the halves of squash.  I like to take a stick of butter and just rub the end of that stick onto the squash, using the wax paper wrapper as a handle.  Sprinkle some brown sugar and give each half a drizzle of maple syrup.  Finish the whole thing with a small sprinkling of salt.

Set the squash, cut sides up, in a baking dish with ~1/2 inch of water in the bottom.  The water will help to prevent the squash from drying out while baking.


Slide the dish into your preheated oven and bake for 1 hour - 1 hour and 15 minutes.  Check it after 1 hour, though.  The squash should be very soft and the tops starting to brown.  


Let it cool for a little bit before digging in.  You can spoon some of the syrupy liquid in the base of the squash over the other exposed areas.  It can be served as is in its own built in "bowl".

Acorn squash are sweet on their own, and this sweetness is accentuated by the sugar-butter-maple syrup mixture.  I usually portion out 1/2 a squash per person as a side dish, although I could easily eat an entire squash by myself.  It's that good.  Enjoy!

Spaghetti Squash with Garlic Butter

Recipe originally found at Steamy Kitchen.

You'll need:

1 spaghetti squash
2 tbs butter
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup finely minced fresh herbs (optional)
1/2 tsp salt (or to taste)
1/4 cup shredded parmesan cheese

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F.  Place your spaghetti squash on a baking sheet and bake for ~1 hour (mine took 1 hour and 10 minutes).  You'll know it's done when you can easily pierce the skin with a sharp knife with little resistance.  Set the squash aside to cool for 10 minutes or so.

Cut the squash in half, lenghtwise.  Use a fork or spoon to remove the seeds and other membranes.  Discard them.  Continue using your fork to scrape the squash to get long strands that resemble spaghetti noodles.  If your squash is proving difficult to scrape out, put it back in the oven for 10 minutes or so.

Look at those squashy strands!

Heat a large sautee pan and melt the butter.  Add the garlic and sautee over medium-low heat for a minute or so.  Once the garlic is fragrant, add your strands of spaghetti squash, salt, and herbs if you're using them.  Add the cheese, and then taste to make sure you don't need more salt.

You can cook for a couple minutes more, or just eat it as is, depending upon your preference for the texture.  Cooking it for a bit longer will obviously make it a bit softer.  It has a bit of a crunch to it to begin with.

Using some fresh herbs would have made it a lot prettier by adding a nice pop of color, and would certainly have imparted some more flavor.  Unfortunately, my herbs bit the dust this past week.  The parsley and chives wilted and couldn't be revived, and the basil started turning brown.  Can I get a moment of silence?  This is a very sad thing indeed.  Oddly enough, my cherry tomato plant is still thriving!  I've gotten more cherry tomatoes off of it in the past few weeks (I wish I had taken pictures.  I had TONS!) than I got pretty much all summer.

This made for a nice, relatively low calorie, albeit interesting side dish.  Since it was just Sean and myself eating dinner, I only ended up using half of the squash.  Those things actually have a lot inside of them!  But you can obviously use as much squash as you need/want to.  Now I just need to figure out how I'm going to use up the other half...