The last time my boyfriend came to Boston, that was in mid-January, we went out to meet some friends for dinner. We ended up in a fancy pub and I for once went with a totally unusual choice: roasted squash. Normally I am the person who orders burgers and fries in a pub. But for some reason this vegan dish sounded so interesting that I had to try it. It was also a little funny because my boyfriend ended up ordering a burger – between the two of us, I am much more of a meat eater whereas he tries to live as vegetarian as possible. I mean I love squash in general, but I also like a good piece of meat every now and then. The dish I ordered turned out to be amazing. And then I remembered that I still had some acorn squashes at home and almost all of the other ingredients. So I tried to make it myself.

I came up with a recipe that I really like. Plus this dish is easy enough to make. Since I like foods a little spicy, I added red pepper flakes. I think they go really well with the sweet cranberries and the maple sirup. I finally also managed to use up my bag of quinoa – although only yesterday I looked into a box on another shelf and found another bag full of it. So cooking more often at home is quite useful because I use up my hidden stocks. In this recipe I make more of the quinoa mixture than I need to fill the squash halves. So you have a little more of it to put next to the squash. Or you just eat it a day later as a cold salad. That’s what I actually did – I filled it into a glass and took it to work with me. Even without the squash it is delicious. Also: If you don’t like blue cheese, just leave it out or substitute it with crmbled feta cheese.

Recipe: Maple Butter Roasted Acorn Squash with Quinoa and Pecans

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Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 45 minutes mins

Total Time 1 hour hr

Ingredients

  

• 2 acorn squashes
• 2 tbsp. butter
• 6 tbsp. maple sirup
• 1 cup quinoa
• 2/3 cup dried cranberries
• 3 tsp. pecan pieces
• 1 cup spinach
• 1 tsp. garlic
• 1/3 onion
• salt
• pepper
• nutmeg
• thyme
• red pepper flakes
• crumbled blue cheese

Instructions

 

• Preheat the oven to 200 °C (400 °F).
• Cut the acorn squashes in half and scoop out the seeds.
• In a little pan melt the butter and mix with 3 tbsp. of the maple sirup. Dab the mix on the insides of the squash halves.
• Put the squash into the oven for about 35 minutes.
• Cook the quinoa in a pot together with about 2 cups of water. It takes about 15 minutes until it's done. Let it cool down a little.
• Mix the quinoa with all remaining ingredients except for the blue cheese.
• After about 35 minutes take the squash out of the oven. Fill the quinoa mix into the halves. Put everything back into the oven for another 10 minutes.
• After taking out the filled squash, sprinkle a bit of crumbled blue cheese on top of each half.

© janavar

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