Squash Court

This week's recipes come from Episode 65 - Squash Court. I love, love, love squash, although I don't actually have very many different squash recipes. My favorite is yellow squash and zucchini fried up with onions and bacon. Mmm! Those are summer squash, though, and with winter approaching it's harder to find, so I've switched to winter squash. I'm very excited to try acorn squash, as I've never before known what to do with it. But for today, since I happened to have spaghetti squash in the fridge, I went with the tried and true.

I'm always surprised when I hear people say they've never eaten spaghetti squash before, or only with spaghetti sauce on it. My parents grew it in their garden, so we ate it a lot. Unfortunately, I've never learned how to tell if it's good or not before I cook it. I've had bad luck with squash I buy at a regular grocery store, so if you're going to try this, go to a produce store or farmer's market. This was one of my unlucky times. I ended up cooking it about twice as long as Alton Brown suggests, and it still didn't get all the way soft. Still, it had a very good flavor. I added butter, salt, pepper, and parmesan cheese, as recommended. I hadn't try cheese before. I couldn't taste it at all, so I won't bother in the future.

And, since it's almost Halloween, I thought I'd include the most famous squash: pumpkin! We carved our jack-o-lantern today. My four-year-old designed the face herself. 

I toasted the seeds with butter, sugar and cinnamon. I didn't bake them long enough for my taste, but my daughter and husband sure liked them!