Spinach Pesto Spaghetti Squash

By Mangia Paleo January 19, 2014 Recipes 9 Comments

You know that tired heavy feeling you get after gladiator-eating a bowl of pasta? I promise that will not happen after you eat this. Trying to recreate Italian dishes is a lot less difficult than it seems. Now I fully understand that this is not pasta. It’s a pasta imPASTAr! But seriously, it’s just as delicious. If you get the fork twirl down correctly you won’t miss the tummy-bloating-food-coma-inducing spaghetti.

Traditional pesto is made with basil, garlic, pine nuts, parmesan cheese, and olive oil. I find it hard to find a lot of fresh basil when it’s not summertime so I replaced it with spinach. Pine nuts are also insanely expensive so I replaced them with walnuts. The taste is just an incredible.

Ingredients:

1 medium spaghetti squash

2 cups water (for the pan)

1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes

1 12 oz bag organic spinach leaves

1/4 cup walnuts

1 large garlic clove

1/2 cup olive oil (add more if needed)

1 tbsp. lemon juice and some zest to taste

S&P to taste

Directions:

Cut the squash length wise in half and scoop out the seeds. Discard the seeds and guts. Place skin side out in a baking dish and fill the bottom with water, covering about 1/2 inch.

Roast squash in oven at 400 degrees for about 35 minutes or until the squash scrapes out easily with a fork.

While the squash is baking you can prep the pesto.

Puree walnuts, garlic clove, lemon juice & zest, and half the amount of olive oil to a food processor. Then add and more olive oil until the pesto is smooth. *Spinach holds more water than basil so be mindful when adding the olive oil.

Next, chop the sun-dried tomatoes into strips. Set aside.

When the spaghetti squash is done cooking scrape all the yummy spaghetti imPASTArs into a separate bowl.

Add sun-dried tomatoes and a few big dollops of spinach pesto to the squash. Mix with a fork.

If you aren’t going to use all the pesto you make within a few days you can freeze it. Simply spoon the leftover pesto into ice cube trays and freeze. When you’re ready to use some just pop out a pesto cube to add to your food.