Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Adventures in new food - Spaghetti Squash

If you have ever tried to only eat one serving of pasta, you know that crushing disappointment of eating two bites of pasta and that is it.  One serving of pasta is 2 oz dry which equals 200 calories.  This is NOT the same a one starch for Les Mills Combat.  One serving of starch is 80 calories = 0.8 oz!  I've tried everything to get the most out of one serving.  I only eat the small pasta like orzo or shells so it seems like I'm eating a lot.  The gluten free alternative have MORE calories per serving.  The whole wheat ones just have more fiber and tend to be denser so you actually get LESS piece per serving.  I LOVE pasta and when I did this calculation, a little part of me died.  I want to be good and follow the plan, but carbs are going to be my downfall.  I had to find an alternative that would be filling and give the illusion of pasta for my really amazing spaghetti sauce that I had JUST made!

Enter the spaghetti squash.  I had heard about this squash and I must admit I was dubious.   I like squash, but I haven't really worked with them a lot.  I though squash was a vegetable, but they count as a starch :(, but one serving = 8 oz!  ten times that of pasta.  So I decided to go for it, and you know what, I like it BETTER than spaghetti!  the squash was super easy to prepare and it added a lightness and deliciousness to the sauce.  I got about four servings of "spaghetti" out of one squash.  I am actually really excited to buy another spaghetti squash and try it in other pasta dishes!

Preparing your squash:

  1. cut your squash in half and remove seeds.
  2. roast halves in the oven for 30 minutes at 375 F.
  3. use a fork to separate strands from stem to stem.
Please feel free to comment about your love or hate of spaghetti squash and if you have any recipes working with this amazing squash!

1 comment:

  1. Can you freeze this for later? If so, I'm thinking roasting a big batch, scooping, and individually bagging for later use might be awesome.

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