Chicken Apple Sausage with Spaghetti Squash and Veggies

After some delay, post numero dos has arrived! Here's an easy dish I pulled together over last week's snow day: chicken apple sausage and spaghetti squash with baby spinach and green beans.

Boyfriend tried to capture the steam but iPhone magic only goes so far.

Overall, it turned out pretty well and was a nice, healthy change from the junk food I've been binging on lately. I think next time around I would use a different kind of chicken apple sausage. The ones I used came from Giant but I much prefer the ones from Trader Joe's that I've used in the past. Another win for TJ.

If you haven't cooked with spaghetti squash before, get ready to be amazed. It takes some extra work but it's a great alternative to pasta.

Anyway, here's how to do it:

Prep Time: ~20 min.

Cook Time: ~1 hr.

Ingredients:

• 1 medium-sized spaghetti squash
• 1 package of chicken apple sausage (can be substituted with any sausage really)
• 1/2 lb green beans
• 1/2 lb baby spinach
• 4 cloves of garlic, peeled and pressed
• 2 tbsp butter
• grated Parmesan
• salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

1. First, we'll cook the spaghetti squash. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Wash and dry your squash.
3. Some people like to cut the squash in half before baking but since I lack upper arm strength and have a special talent for injuring myself, I prefer to cook it whole and avoid trying to hack at it raw. If you go the whole squash route, use a knife to stab the squash all over so that steam can be released while cooking (much like baking a potato).
4. Once the oven is ready, place the squash on a baking sheet in the oven and let it bake for ~ 40 min. or until you can pierce the skin easily with a knife.
   
   
   
5. While the squash is cooking, we'll move on to the green beans. If the beans aren't already cleaned and prepared, wash them in cold water and remove the ends. 
6. Bring an appropriately-sized pot of water to a rapid boil. With recipes like this, I prefer to blanch my green beans. Blanching is basically cooking a vegetable in rapidly boiling water for a short amount of time until the vegetable is tender. 
7. Once at a rapid boil, add the beans and cook for about 3 minutes.
8. Drain immediately and rinse under cold water. This will preserve the color and texture of the green beans while we wait for the other pieces of the meal to come together.
   
   
   
   
   
9. Is your squash ready now? COOL. Get it out of the oven and using pot holders, place it on a cutting board.
10. Holding the squash with one pot-holder protected hand, cut the squash in half. You'll want to use a good, sturdy chef's knife for this. Also, be careful as the squash will be very hot and probably releasing some steam as you do this.
11. Once you have your squash halves, scrap out and toss the seeds and fibrous center.
12. Then, using a fork, scrape out the inside of the squash into a bowl. Spaghetti squash separates into stringy pieces (like spaghetti) when cooked.

    

    Like so

13. Set aside the spaghetti squash for now. I promise we're almost done.
14. Heat a pan and melt the butter.
15. While that is happening, slice up your sausage.
16. Add sausage to the pan and sauté until almost cooked through.
17. Add the pressed garlic and continue to cook until garlic is golden.
18. Add your spaghetti squash and toss to mix. If you have more squash than the pan can handle, that's fine. You can save it for another meal.
19. Continue to cook about 3-5 min. so that the spaghetti squash absorbs some of the flavor from the pan. Add salt and pepper to taste.
20. Add your green beans, toss to mix, and remove from heat.
21. Place raw baby spinach on a plate and serve the sausage-squash mixture over it, topping with however much grated Parmesan your little heart desires.

And that's it!

Since it's pretty basic, this would be a great recipe to experiment with if you want to try out say different types of spices or meat or veggies. If you try something new with it, let me know! I'd love to feature your variation on the blog.

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