ACORN SQUASH OVEN HOW TO

Use your fingers to separate the seeds from the fibrous, stringy stuff.Place the seeds into a mixing bowl and cover them with water.Preheat the oven to 325 degrees and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

ACORN SQUASH OVEN HOW TO

Enjoying the SeedsĪcorn squash seeds are delicious and make a fantastic snack or topping for soups and stews! Here’s how to prepare them: Just add diced roasted acorn squash to your soup or stew towards the end of cooking. Stews, Chilis, and RisottosĪcorn squash adds a wonderful, gentle sweetness to stews, chilis, and risottos. You can sauté the roasted acorn squash with onions, garlic, and other vegetables, add water or broth, and puree to make a creamy, delicious soup. Serve topped with butter and spices of your choice. Just take your roasted acorn squash and mash it as you would mashed potatoes. Or, mash it up for a simple, delicious side dish. You can then scoop out the flesh and use in soups, stews, or risottos. You will know the squash is fully cooked when a fork can easily pierce through the flesh. Brush the cut sides with extra virgin olive oil, season as desired, place cut-side up on the baking sheet, and bake for about 45 minutes. To roast the acorn squash that you halved (as described above), preheat oven to 400. From there you will be able to dice or mash it up to incorporate into dishes or enjoy it on its own. There are many ways to enjoy acorn squash in your meals, but for almost every recipe the first step is going to be baking or roasting the squash. This won’t cook the squash, but will soften it up just a little, making it easier to get through the hard outer shell. You can either toss the seeds or save them to roast and enjoy as a healthy snack (see below for directions).Īnd then, even if you do need to make more cuts, you have a flat side to work with, which makes cutting much easier.īonus Tip: If this still feels too scary, you can make the squash easier to cut by microwaving it for 1-2 minutes. To do this, just use a spoon to scoop them out. Once you have cut it in half, you will want to remove the seeds.

This will get your knife safely inside and then you can slowly turn the squash while you continue to push your knife through. To do this, hold the squash steady with one hand, put the tip of the knife near the acorn squash stem, in the crevice between two ridges, and cut down towards the bottom of the squash. Using a sharp knife will help you to get into the squash more easily and will reduce the risk of the squash rolling out on you.Īnother thing to know is that for many acorn squash recipes including this Savory Baked Acorn Squash, you only need to make one cut: in half, from top to bottom. The first thing to know is that you want to cut it with a sharp knife. It felt like I spent hours fighting my knife through and worrying that I would cut myself, until I learned some tricks. When I first started working with acorn squash I found the hardness of the squash and the ridges to be pretty intimidating. The first step in cooking acorn squash is to cut it up.

Cheese (especially, goat, feta, and Parmesan).

Some flavors and foods that go well with acorn squash include: Here’s what you can make with acorn squash: Flavor PartnersĪs mentioned above, one of the things that makes acorn squash so fantastic is that it is incredibly versatile, both in terms of what you can make with it, but also in terms of all of the different flavors you can add. It also has over 78% of your daily Vitamin C – again making it a winner in fighting off colds.Īcorn squash is also rich in carotenoid pigments, which studies show are good for both cardiovascular health and cancer prevention. This is important because Vitamin A supports bone and eye health, as well as your immune system. First and foremost, it is rich in Vitamin A. In addition, acorn squash offers a ton of nutritional benefits. Why Eat Acorn Squash?įirst and foremost, acorn squash is delicious! It has a slightly sweet (I find it is less sweet than butternut squash), earthy, and nutty flavor that makes it an extremely versatile ingredient.

Once I got over this fear, it became one of my favorite winter squashes. For years, though, I continued to find acorn squash to be an intimidating vegetable, especially because it was so hard to cut (tips on this below!). I savored the balance between sweetness and earthiness that it offered and was hooked. My first real encounter with acorn squash didn’t come until I was in my 20s when my mom shared a recipe for an acorn squash soup that I instantly fell in love with. If you’ve never cooked with it before, acorn squash can be a little bit intimidating, so I wanted to share my tips on how to cook acorn squash as well as recipes to get you started.

Acorn squash oven