Carb Alternative: Spaghetti Squash

In my constant pursuit to merge my healthy eating requirements with family meals, I have to remind myself that a few vegetables offer great carb alternatives in dishes.

Spaghetti Squash

Take the spaghetti squash, for example. Tonight is spaghetti night and I decided it was time to reintroduce spaghetti squash into the meal. The following are my basic spaghetti sauce ingredients:

HEB Tomato & Basil Spaghetti Sauce (2g of sugar)
HEB Gluten Free Spaghetti Pasta
1 lb of ground turkey (cheaper, 20g of protein, less fat)
1 lb of ground meat (tastier)
1 or 2 small cans of tomato sauce
spaghetti squash (1/2 a gourd)
your choice of spices, (I like sea salt, pepper, garlic, basil, sage, and oregano).

Here's a short note about spaghetti sauce. Please read labels because most spaghetti sauce has 11g or more of sugar per serving. Servings are much smaller than we anticipate them to be. This is the one jar of sauce that has the least amount of sugar I have found.

I often enjoy gluten free pasta, but tonight had to be low-carb to balance out a carb lunch. One time, when I stood in a grocery store in San Angelo next to my sister, I went to apologize about the gluten free pasta price and found it was similar and/or cheaper to traditional spaghetti noodles. I hadn't anticipated that.

Spagehtti squash is an easy, tasty low-carb solution. Spaghetti Squash is extremely easy to prepare. You cut it open like you would cantaloupe and carve out the seeds.

Place it flesh-down on a plate and nuke for 20 minutes. In the meantime, you cook your spaghetti meal as usual. When it's done, use a fork to carve out the flesh and it comes out in a spaghetti-like form.

My mother learned you can cook a whole squash in the microwave for the same time and you take the seeds out after cooking. Cutting the gourd in half is easier if you cook it first.  I prefer removing the seeds beforehand. You'd have to use this method if you wanted to try a recipe with stuffed spaghetti squash (see links below).

Serve your spaghetti sauce on top. I've found that a quarter of a squash is enough for one serving, so the other quarter portion is great for lunch the next day (the other half of the gourd is wrapped in tin foil and sits in my fridge drawer until I'm ready to cook it). One cup of spaghetti squash has 7g of carbs (a 4 pound squash will yield 5 cups), so a quarter gourd equals approximately 9g. That's really not that bad, and it's even better when Doc says veggie carbs don't count!!

Other Menu Items with Spaghetti Squash

• Scrumptious side dish to chicken, pork chops, or steak. Add butter, salt, and pepper for dreaminess.
• Pasta alternative with Alfredo sauce and Shrimp (seasoned as you prefer your shrimp).
• George Stella's Sausage Stuffed Spaghetti Squash  (pictured here). If you follow anyone on Pinterest, may I suggest this link to follow Mr. Stella?
• Spaghetti Squash Carbonara Bacon lovers, rejoice!
• CraftCanada.com has several recipes, including Cheesy Spaghetti Squash and Parmesan Spaghetti Squash Carbonara.

Honestly, run a simple Google search for spaghetti squash recipes and you will be overloaded with wonderful ideas to cause major salivation. Spaghetti squash can be roasted in the oven as a stuffed entree and nuked in the microwave and carved out. It's tasty and does not distract from any flavors added to it. Isn't that pasta's entire purpose? To fill up a saucy meal? Well, now you have spaghetti squash to make it low-carb. Enjoy!