Monday, May 3, 2010

Cooking Spaghetti Squash

I've been meaning to post this little how-to for quite some time. I realized I'd better get on it - the squash are almost gone! I have two left and they'll be eaten very soon. I cooked one about a week ago and discovered one of the seeds had actually sprouted INSIDE the squash. The squash was still in good shape, no rot or soft spots but it was a little reminder that they won't last forever.

I'm actually quite impressed with how well they've kept. I picked them in October and it's now May. I had one that was starting to go bad a couple months ago but it was still good enough that I cooked it & added it to the dogs' dinner. I stored them under the buffet in the dining room. It's not near a heat vent, shielded from the sun and close enough to the kitchen that I remember to eat them!

If you'd like to see how they grew, check this link: Spaghetti Squash posts

I grew the Small Wonder variety of spaghetti squash. This is actually one of the smaller ones. It's little enough that I can eat it myself. While I normally have no trouble eating leftovers, when I tried leftover spaghetti squash, I wasn't very happy with it. I'd recommend only cooking half the squash if it's too big to eat at once. Scoop the seeds from the second half, wrap it & pop it in the fridge for another day or so.


Rinse the squash if needed and carefully cut it in half. Be sure to keep track of all your fingers, sometimes the squash are not the easiest to cut.

Scoop out the seeds (which you can cook and eat like pumpkin seeds if you want to) and place in a microwave safe dish. Microwave on high until soft enough to dent when pressed. I'll recommend a knife handle for this task though I often use my fingertip for this (and soon regret it). This little guy took about 9 minutes to cook.



Once cooked, I let it cool a few minutes then holding the skin with a towel, I scrape the stands out with a fork. Then add a little butter, garlic, salt & pepper & Parmesan cheese.

Top it off with a sprinkling of mozzarella.

Then bake until the cheese starts to brown.

I'll admit, this may not actually be the prettiest I've ever cooked- I used the toaster oven and then left it in a touch too long (I was chatting with hubby on Skype). It was still pretty tasty though!
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7 comments:

Mr. H. said...

Small Wonder, what a nice little squash. Our spagetti squash always gets much to large, I will keep your variety in mind as it would be perfect for us. The baked squash dish sounds delicious.

Ribbit said...

That's one of my favorite kinds of squash. I haven't tried to grow it yet, but I sure do enjoy eating it.

sb158 said...

Sounds good. I'd like to grow it, but since I'm the only one who'd even think about eating it, seems kind of pointless. Sigh...being married to a picky eater who passed his picky gene on to his kids is a royal PITA...

Amy said...

Mr H, with only 2 of us in the house, regular ones are too huge for us too. The bigger ones that grew last year are about twice the size this one was- just about right for 2 maybe 3 people. I got the seeds from Park's last year.

Ribbit, if you can keep those rotten little bugs away, you should try it sometime! :-)

sb, don't pick on the picky eaters too much - you should see the list of things I don't eat. :D I think my mother hoped for years that I'd grow out of it. I had never eaten spaghetti squash before last year. Guess I felt adventurous one day and it turned out well. If it helps any, it's not a very "squashy" flavored squash. Especially with a little garlic & cheese. You'll never pass it off as pasta but it's not an overwhelming flavor. That's why I eat it.

Toni said...

I've never eaten spaghetti squash! Sounds really yummy the way you prepared it!

lookmanoweeds said...

Thanks for the spaghetti squash recipe. I had one at a friend's house years ago, and it was so delicious. I've bought a few spaghetti squash over the years, but I never could cook it properly. It was always undercooked or just kinda blah.

I think I'll order some spaghetti squash seeds and put them in my winter garden. Where did you get yours?

Amy said...

It took me a few tries to cook it right myself. We first tried it a couple years ago and hubby cooked it. Since he was in Korea this winter, I had to master it on my own since I had about 15 of them to eat :-)
I got the seeds last year from Park's. You might try a google search for seed sources if Park's is still showing they're out of stock.