Well, there’s no denying it anymore. Winter has officially reached Los Angeles. It’s been freezing here – and since I can’t quite bring myself to turn on the heat, I do the next best thing… crank up the oven and bake, roast and toast away! Lately I’ve been all over the acorn squash from my farmers markets. My favorite way to serve this deletable squash is stuffed with a healthy quinoa salad. So basically it’s like an edible bowl with a quinoa salad in it. Best idea ever. The quinoa salad itself is awesome, but then when you take a scoop of the acorn squash, it just puts the salad over the top with flavor!
Quinoa Stuffed Acorn Squash
Ingredients
- 1 acorn squash
- 1 tbsp butter
- 1 cup cooked quinoa
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 small yellow onion chopped
- 6 scallions sliced on a bias
- 2 cloves garlic chopped
- 1/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
- 1/4 cup shredded hard goat cheese
- 1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
- Slice the acorn squash in half, from the tip to the bottom. Using a spoon, scoop out the seeds and discard. Place the 2 pieces on a baking sheet. Divide the butter in half and place each pad of butter in the center of the squash. Season with salt and pepper. Add 1 cup of water to the bottom of the baking dish so the bottom of the squash doesn't burn. Place the squash in the oven and let it roast for 60 - 70 minutes.
- Remove squash from the oven once the insides of the squash is fork tender.
- In a large skillet add the olive oil over medium high heat. Saute the onion for about 7 minutes until they are translucent. Add the garlic and saute for 1 minute more. Add the scallions and stir until just together. Remove skillet from heat.
- Season the onion mixture with salt and pepper. Add the cooked quinoa, shredded Parmesan cheese and lemon juice. Toss together and adjust seasoning as needed.
- Place half of the quinoa mixture in each of the squash cavities. Sprinkle the shredded hard goat cheese on top. Place the squash back into the oven for about 5 minutes, just until the goat cheese cheese slightly melts.
- Remove from oven and serve immediately.
WOW, what an awesome fall-y, wintery recipe. It presents beautifully, and sounds healthy AND delicious! Also, I love recipes for two meals. SO helpful! 🙂
Gaby- these are really quite beautiful. Way to make eating healthy look so indulgent!
I hear you on turning up the oven to heat up the apartment as I’ve been doing that all week too!
This sounds lovely Gaby!
Glad to hear we are not the only ones being cold. It was -8 F the other night.
Still have lots of squash and we love Quinoa. Great recipe. Thanks. Kirsten
I’m all over this. Good things happen when there’s an edible bowl involved.
The perfect meal! Love it girl 🙂
I am off to the market to pick up some squash. This looks absolutely delicious – my kind of meal!
Thank you for reminding me that I have an acorn squash that needs roasting! What a great recipe!
Beautiful photo’s. I like how you added quinoa, it definately bumps up the protein to balance out the carbs. The addition of cheese makes it even better!
Tried this last night – Definitely one of my new favorites!!!
Yum! I added sausage and the quinoa-sausage combination was delicious!