Stuffed Acorn Squash

[kb0426]

I have to start with - if you had told me thirty days ago that I would enjoy acorn squash as my first meal of the day, I would have called you crazy.

Now who is the crazy one?

I had every intention of having leftover Zucchini et Aglio from Well Fed. I made that yesterday and added beaten eggs and sardines. YUM.

But, the acorn squash sitting on the counter looked at me and said "now or never."

I have seen many recipes for a stuffed acorn squash, so I decided just to throw some things together that I had that sounded like it would taste good and it worked brilliantly!

I am no chef, so I am just going to narrate what I did.

Acorn squash

Bulk Mild sausage (check package for no sugar!)

frozen spinach

eggs

coconut oil

cinnamon

nutmeg

salt

Other ingredients are up to you!

I preheated my oven to 400 degrees.

Slice acorn squash in half, and remove seeds. I also sliced a small piece off the green side, so that they would lay flat.

Rub the inside with coconut oil, kosher salt, cinnamon and fresh nutmeg. Bake until fork tender. (I never time anything. It may be considered a character flaw by some.)

While your acorn squash is baking, cook up your sausage. I like to cook and then put the sausage on a tray lined with paper towels to drain off the extra fat.

In the same pan, dump in a bag of frozen spinach. Dump is probably not the most glamorous term, but it best describes what I did.

Cook the spinach until all of the excess water seems to be out of it. Add your sausage back into the pan and combine.

When your acorn squash is ready, stuff it with the sausage spinach mixture. (The leftover mixture will be used throughout the week for making omelets.) You could go ahead and crack an egg directly into this. but I had 2 issues with that. I had really stuffed these bad boys and was afraid my egg would slither off, and I am not the biggest fan of what oven baking does to an egg white. Instead, I pan fried eggs in coconut oil.

I put the stuffed acorn squash back in the oven for a bit while I fried my eggs.

Remove from the oven, plate and top with your fried egg. Dig in and enjoy!

Or, as in my case, enjoy while your dog begs to partake in some of the deliciousness.

[Tom Denham]

I may try your approach as it sounds faster than what I did on Friday. I took one pound of ground pork and made my own sausage by mixing in salt, garlic powder, cayenne pepper, and ground sage. I also chopped an onion and mixed half of it into the pork. Then I prepped the acorn squash and filled the cavities with my pork sausage. I roasted the pork-filled acorn squash in the oven at 400 degrees for 60 minutes and the pork only got up to 145 degrees when I tested it. Pork should get to 165, so I put one serving in the microwave and nuked it 4 minutes. That got the temp up high enough and I ate it. It was so good, I microwaved the other serving and ate it too. Oh yeah, I dusted the squash with a little salt and garlic powder before stuffing the cavities with pork. And I added a quarter inch of water to the bottom of the pan I was roasting the squash in so nothing would burn in the oven.

Roasting the squash with pork in it creates good taste, but it takes too long to get the pork cooked through. Browning the pork in a skillet first makes a lot of sense.

[Tracy R.]

I have 2 acorn squash in my potato bin and I've not known what to do with them. We've never had it before. I know now! Can't wait for tomorrow nights dinner. Thanks!