Ah, you know it’s August when the first of the hard shelled squashes arrive. Spaghetti squash is in the house.
We’ve got maybe a dozen spaghetti squash recipes at grassfedcow.com including one for spaghetti squash pie that I got from a friend, published in the AJC and that I try to make every year.
Recently I got one of those emails with 50 things to do with spaghetti squash. It’s from thekitchn.com. I thought their idea for a broccoli and cheese spaghetti squash casserole was fun and totally different from the recipes we usually see. I’ve appended it below.
Meanwhile, I’m pondering a slicer tomato just about the same size as a seedless watermelon (!!) and more of the great cucumber deluge of 2020. I do love cucumbers and have been lazily slicing any extras into leftover pickling brine.
We have a recipe for pickled red onion running in the AJC this week (it accompanies a story about fruit-and-vegetable salads including Summer Salad from Hampton + Hudson) and after I fished out the onions, I saved the pretty pink-tinged brine and sliced my last Kirby cucumbers into it. In that same cover story, there’s a mango vinaigrette (you make it using frozen mango – so easy and no worrying about finding a flavorful mango) that goes with Butcher + Brew’s Tropical Salad. I cut up a tomato, a few peaches, and yes, more cucumber and then covered it all with that mango vinaigrette. Quick, cool, delicious and featuring three of my favorite summer fruits, because, yes, tomatoes and cucumbers are really fruits.
What else does this week’s box inspire? Well, I can tell you I took the lazy way out with last week’s okra. I had reason to prepare bacon (which I do by putting it in a roasting pan and then into a 400 degree oven – no mess, no splatter, easy). When I was contemplating how to deal with the bacon fat that remained in the roasting pan, it occurred to me (really, only now I’m figuring this out?) to add the okra from last week’s box plus a few cubed precooked potatoes and roll them in the fat, sprinkle with salt and then roast until golden. Best okra ever. Even the okra-hater that lives here ate it.
I could have thrown in a few of those cherry and miniature plum tomatoes towards the end of the roasting, but honestly, I love those little tomatoes so much that I just eat them by the handful. And the peppers from last week? They went on the grill.
So you can see, very little actual cooking and recipes last week and I think this week’s box will share the same fate. Except for that spaghetti squash ….
Broccoli and Cheese Spaghetti Squash Casserole
From thekitchen.com.
Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Stir 1 1/2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese, 2 cups cottage cheese, 3 large eggs, 1 teaspoon kosher salt, and 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper together in a large bowl. Bring 3 cups (1-inch) broccoli florets and 2 tablespoons water to a boil in a large ovenproof skillet over medium-high heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, until broccoli is crisp-tender and water evaporates, 2 to 3 minutes.
Remove skillet from heat. Stir in the scraped-out strands from 1 (2 1/2 to 3-pound) cooked spaghetti squash and the cheese mixture. Sprinkle with 1/2 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese. Bake until set and a knife inserted into the center comes out clean, about 1 hour.