Bang for Your Buck Spaghetti Squash

Submitted by Gluten Free Me

"Actually learned this by accident when I forgot to take the spaghetti squash out of the oven. It significantly increases the amount of spaghetti squash I am able to get out of each squash."

 

• Ready In: 1hr 5mins
• Ingredients: 2
• Yields: 6 cups
• Serves: 4-6

ingredients

• 1 spaghetti squash
• 1⁄4 cup water

directions

1. Preheat oven to 450.
2. Wash and remove stickers from spaghetti squash.
3. Cut the squash in half. (Be careful spaghetti squash can be very hard)
4. Remove seeds from the middle of each half.
5. Put water in pan large enough to hold the 2 halves of the squash inside facing down. I usually use 8x11.
6. Place squash in pan inside facing down.
7. Bake for 1 - 2 hours depending on size of squash. When squash is ready the top of the squash skin should be browned and slightly brittle. When you touch the top of the squash with a fork the skin should give little resistance.
8. After you remove from oven let cool for 10 - 20 minutes.
9. When cool pierce top of spaghetti squash skin with fork and peel away. All of the skin should easily peel away from the squash's interior. (Make sure and watch out for steam)
10. After skin is peeled move halves to bowl and shred with 2 forks until it has a spaghetti like consistency.

Reviews

[Garden Gate Kate]

I roasted a three and a half pound spaghetti squash at 450F degrees for one hour and then lowered the temperature to 350F degrees for one more hour. The outer skin became brittle hard and dark brown, but the inside was moist, tender, and sweet. Roasting for such a long time caramelizes the natural sugars in the squash developing a sweeter flavor than when the spaghetti squash is baked for a shorter amount of time like most recipes recommend. Furthermore, the longer baking time breaks down the plant cell walls allowing moisture to release causing the spaghetti squash to be more succulent and juicy than when it's cooked for a shorter time. The flesh slipped right away from the brittle skin without wasting one strand of squash. I recommend scooping out only the amount that you plan to eat and refrigerating the leftovers in the harden shell to preserve moistness. Thank you, Gluten Free Me, for a simple, healthy, and delicious recipe!

 

[ekearns111]

"Toss it in the oven" is my kind of recipe. I have the day off tomorrow (translation: I have plenty of time to scrape exploded squash from inside the thing that heats up,) so tonight's the night. I have no idea how much the squash weighed, but it was pretty big. At 7pm, I put it in a casserole dish with about an inch and a half of water and shoved it in the oven on 350 degrees. I checked on it at 8pm, and it still seemed really roly-poly so I left it in. At 9, I pressed on the skin with the handle of a spatula and it seemed hard so I figured I'd leave it in for one more hour. Then I forgot about it. For another two hours. When I realized my error, at 11pm, and pulled it out of the oven, I was surprised to find that it burnt, but not as burnt as the photo. I sliced into it and steam came out as if from an overheated radiator. Exciting! The burned bit was dry and stiff, and all the flesh was slumped in the bottom. I was worried that because I hadn't scooped out the seeds that it would be hard to get the flesh out, but it was easy enough. I also worried that the whole thing would smell like burned stuff but surprise- it was great! Yay! (I love it when food doesn't explode.)