Spaghetti Squash a la CeCe

This is a guest post from my sister CeCe.  Unlike us, she knows a spaghetti squash when she sees one.  Heh.

She writes:

Hi Juli & Jeffrey,

Last weekend I picked up a spaghetti squash at our local farmers market. I know you guys end up getting quite a bit of squash with your co-op and I thought would pass this recipe along. Last night I wanted pizza and made this recipe instead when they said 45-60 minutes for delivery. This really hit the spot and was a much healthier choice for me! I had been looking for a recipe to use up some of our tomatoes (I swear they all turn red at once!) and came  up with this recipe:

Easy Spaghetti Squash
recipe with only 4 ingredients, plus you don't have to turn the oven on!!

1 spaghetti squash
4 TBSP butter or 2 TBSP olive oil (your preference)
1 lb sausage (your preference for type of sausage--try turkey sausage for a healthier spin)
2 tomatoes chopped up (whatever tomatoes you have--canned, fresh, roma, heirloom, etc)

Cut the spaghetti squash in half and spoon out the seeds. Pierce the squash flesh with a fork several times. Rub butter or olive oil on the squash. Cover with saran swap and microwave for 5 minutes, microwaving each half separately (for a total of 10 actual cooking minutes). Let set on counter for 3-5 minutes to finish cooking and cool before shredding. I didn't salt or pepper the squash because of the saltiness of the sausage.

While the squash is cooking, fry up your sausage and chop up your tomatoes. When the squash is done, shred it with a fork and place the squash shreds into a casserole dish. Drain the sausage (you can even put the sausage in a strainer and run hot water over it to get even more fat off). Add cooked sausage to squash shreds. Add tomatoes and mix together. Top or mix in cheese if you like, but it is so full of flavor without it, you don't really need it!

I had thought about adding oregano, but forgot it. BTW, our squash was a pretty large one, (probably yielded 6-8 C of squash) and the only sausage I had on hand was 1 package of Little sizzlers sausage and 1 pkg jimmy dean pre-cooked sausage crumbles. Because the squash was so large, I added used both types of sausage. Tomatoes were from the garden. The sausage really hit my yearning for pizza and the result really tasty. This probably made enough for 4-6 people, but Bill and I ate it all except for 2 C of the stuff.

You could certainly make it vegetarian by sauteing peppers, mushrooms, onions, and tomatoes and leaving out the sausage. So the recipe is pretty flexible.

The crazy thing is that I really don't like squash, but I loved this recipe!  I guess if you add enough sausage, I would eat just about anything! lol

Have a great day!  Happy Birthday, sista!

(Yes, today is my birthday!)