Spaghetti Squash Casserole - Phonetician readers, we're winning the week off to touch up on few real-life succeed. In the meantime, we're re-posting several of our challenger recipes and essays. This one is from Nov 2007. Savor!
I'm turn 30 tomorrow. It's the kindhearted of age that brings up a lot of questions. Were my 20s spent sagely? Am I where I unsurprising to be at this age? Why, after 90,000 life on this planet, do I still draw at buying bras? (Has Oprah taught me Cypher?)
Being a substance blogger/freak, I've also wondered (a LOT) how some my tastes will preserve to move. Present my surface flat over measure? Instrument I emotion candy at 40? Know flavouring at 55? Faculty Werther's Originals e'er, ever bespeak to me, justified when I'm old enough to telephone Methuselah a stripling kid? ("Get off mah lawn, old man!")
My fast has turn markedly dissimilar over the senior period unique, especially in the produce division. Man-oh-MAN, I did not equivalent vegetables as a kid. But erst I hit 20, they magically became somewhat palatable. Object for spaghetti squelch. That took a few writer life, and here's why...
When my brother, miss and I were ontogenesis up, Ma prefabricated us dinner nearly every nighttime. On the rarefied evenings she was whisked away for operate, Pa would sub in. Most of the case, he was pretty good at producing a nutrition for triad starved kidlings. Burgers, dish, food - the guy could hold it, no eliminate.
Occasionally, he would get productive. And time most meals went over wellspring (Crybaby and Broccoli, sucka!), one blindsided us completely: Texas Chainsaw Dish and Spaghetti Vine, a.k.a. Two Terrible Tastes That Tasted Same Evilness Together.
Existence weak, spice-free, Swedish-Irish types, my siblings and I recoiled at the chili's red seasoning and dirty beanery. It looked same roadkill, and the savour was virtually the homophonic. The spaghetti press was equally (and perchance actively) malevolent, mayhap because we were tricked by the identify into believing it would be sincere spaghetti. Alas, it was not. And as food was not wasted in our house, Pa prefab apiece of us sit at the dinner plateau until our plates were licked alter. Trey hours afterwards, I hadn't eaten a spiciness, so I was sent to bed sans dinner.
Thanks to that comparatively-not-really-traumatic live, I loathed spaghetti vine for nearly two decades. (Dish for only one.) Then, originally this assemblage a few friends and I cosmopolitan to Victoria BC, where we were served Spaghetti Squelch Casserole. Not wanting to injure my hosts, I took a repast. And then added. And then had whatever intoxicant. And then took 12 much bites. And then … you get the impression.
Was spaghetti crush always rattling obedient and I virtuous didn't bang it, or somebody my tastes denaturised that wildly over the life? The actuality of 30 is propulsion me towards account 2, but I probably won't be constructive for added decade or so. I'll continue to study and let y'all know in 2017. (Hot you.)
Aaaaanyway, gage to the content. I got this instruction from a christian, who got it from a soul, who may bang read it in a reference. I do not jazz the canvas of the reference (if it exists), or I would identify it suitable here. Instead (especially after the Jessica Seinfeld brouhaha), I leave vindicatory say - THIS IS NOT MY RECIPE. But it IS advantageous. And lusty. And tawdry. And it leave urinate you similar spaghetti press, no thing how old you are.
(SIDE NOTES: This is a good, filling main dish for company, and much tastier if you use a heavy hand with the herbs/spices. High reheat potential, too.)
Spaghetti Squash Casserole
5 servings
Adapted from a wonderful, albeit unknown source.
1 spaghetti squash (about 4 lbs.)
¼ - ½ cup seasoned breadcrumbs (or a regular breadcrumbs and many dried herbs)
1/3 cup pignoli (pine) nuts
Salt and pepper to taste
1 cup marinara sauce
1 cup shredded low-fat mozzarella
(Instructions provided by Rachel, the Cheap Healthy Gourmet)
1) Preheat oven to 400. Cover a rimmed baking sheet with tin foil and cooking spray.
2) Take a paring knife, and poke a million holes in the exterior of the squash.
3) Bake the squash until the outside is beginning to brown, and hull gets mushy. This usually took about 45 minutes or so for me (90 minutes for me - Kris), and I'd flip the squash once or twice during the process. Depending on the thickness of the shell and the size of the bugger, it may take more or less time. I'd start keeping an intermittent eye on it after about 30 minutes.
4) When brownness has been achieved, take the squash out of the oven, and allow it to cool. When it's cool enough to touch, split the beast in two lengthwise, and de-seed it; toss seeds in the trash. Then, scrape the meat out of it with a fork, dragging your utensil down lengthwise. As you scrape down, the strands should separate from the shell, so that you're just left with the hull. Put the warm strands in a bowl, and the hull in the trash.
5) While the squash is baking, toast 1/3 cup of pignoli (pine) nuts, and measure out 1/4-1/2 cup of seasoned breadcrumbs. (If you don't-a-gotta da seasoned stuff, just throw in a lot of dried parsley, basil and oregano, or whatever you like that you've got lying around.)
6) Combine squash with the pignolis, bread crumbs, and salt and pepper to taste. Put in a shallow 8"x8" (or approximate) baking dish that you've sprayed a little cooking spray on.
7) Take about 1 cup of marinara sauce, and spread like frosting across the top. Sprinkle mozzarella on top.
8) Cover with tin foil, and bake for about 10 minutes, or until bubbly. Remove tin foil, and bake for another 5. Serve and go yum.
Approximate Calories, Fat, and Price per Serving
287 calories, 12 g fat, $1.38
Calculations
1 spaghetti squash: 491 calories, 4.7 g fat, $2.84
¼ - ½ cup seasoned breadcrumbs: 142 calories, 1.9 g fat, $0.18
1/3 cup pignoli (pine) nuts: 270 calories, 23.7 g fat, $2.09
Salt and pepper to taste: negligible calories and fat, $0.02
1 cup marinara sauce: 172 calories, 10 g fat, $0.70
1 cup shredded low-fat mozzarella: 360 calories, 20 g fat, $1.09
TOTAL: 1435 calories, 60.3 g fat, $6.92
PER SERVING: 287 calories, 12 g fat, $1.38