Simple Sunday Meal & Save Yourself the Carbs

It seemed like every Sunday when I was growing up our family would have spaghetti for dinner. This was probably for a couple of reasons: 

• It was a really easy meal to put together
• It was so easy that my mom could assign me or one of my 7 siblings to make it without worrying about the state of the kitchen after the fact
• We had 10 people in our family so we bought noodles and Prego in bulk and always had the ingredients on hand
• It was a dinner that almost everyone liked (one of my brothers had a problem with the tomatoes in the sauce and would painstakingly pick out every single one before he would eat anything and eventually my mom agreed that as long as he ate a bite of the sauce, he could put butter and salt on the rest of the noodles. Which he was fine with. He used a LOT of butter. We're talking spoonfuls. Although there was that one time that he took a spoonful of margarine and ate it like it was ice cream…but that's a story for a different time.)

So now that I'm trying to get on board the "healthy train" and trying my hand at carb cycling, it makes it hard to enjoy my traditional Sunday spaghetti without getting a pit in my tummy and feeling a little (sometimes a lot) guilty. But there is a way!

Spaghetti Squash!!!

"How to Save 130 Calories on Your Bowl of Pasta"

I found this pin, tried it and I love it. (I don't know if the 130 calories is accurate because it all depends on portion size but I'll do a comparison of spaghetti squash vs noodles at the end.) Instead of cooking up some spaghetti noodles, I cook a spaghetti squash and it's just as good but so much healthier! 

Using spaghetti squash is almost just as easy as using noodles too. Instead of throwing noodles in water for a while, you put a squash in the oven for an hour and you're good! Well, almost. :)

Good things require work and good things require patience, right?

Here's how I make my spaghetti squash:

**I am including pictures but please excuse my use of an iPhone camera and my terrible kitchen lighting**

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Stab the spaghetti squash repeatedly all over with a knife (this will make it so the pressure that builds up in the oven can be released easily instead of exploding and making a mess for you to clean).

2. Place the squash in a pan or tray on the middle rack of the oven for 60 - 75 minutes (this is where the patience comes in. Noodles cook faster, yes, but this is worth the wait. Also, you don't have to check it to make sure it's not boiling over, over cooking or undercooking, and you don't have to throw it on a wall to find out if it's done).

3. Remove the tray with the squash from the oven, wait about 5 minutes for it to cool a bit (be careful and use oven mitts because it will still be hot!!) and then cut in in half length-wise.

4. Using a big spoon, remove the seed from the middle of the squash.

5. Take a fork and separate the "noodles" of the squash and dish onto a plate. 

6. Cover the spaghetti squash with sauce of your choice (I am a HUGE red sauce fan so for me it's marinara) and enjoy!! 

**Thank you for not judging me on my photography skills or lack thereof**

Comparing 1 cup of spaghetti squash to noodles this is what I found:

                     Squash (Based on Wikipedia and verified by Dr. Oz)                 Noodles (Based on Barilla Spaghetti Noodles)
Calories                                          31                                                                                                        200
Total Fat (g)                                   0.6                                                                                                        1.0
Protein (g)                                      0.6                                                                                                         7
Carbs (g)                                         7                                                                                                           42

Judging by these few nutrition facts, if you are trying to get your protein in for the day, the noodles would be the way to go. But if you're trying to get your protein from this food group, there is whole other discussion we need to have. (Eat a string cheese. One string cheese has 8 grams of protein and doesn't have the calories or carbs.)

BUT if you're looking for a way to enjoy pasta-type sauces and recipes without the carbs and calories, substituting spaghetti squash is a GREAT way to go. :-) Happy cooking!