{"id":104,"date":"2011-06-04T18:36:42","date_gmt":"2011-06-05T01:36:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/safaraf.com\/?p=104"},"modified":"2012-02-11T21:06:58","modified_gmt":"2012-02-12T04:06:58","slug":"quinoa-stuffed-squash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/?p=104","title":{"rendered":"Quinoa stuffed squash"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>So this weekend I had a wonderful experience and experiment with my garden.\u00c2\u00a0 I woke up ready to water the garden as I normally do every other day.\u00c2\u00a0 But this morning I could not believe my eyes.\u00c2\u00a0 Nestled between the spiky leaves and large yellow flowers that I peeled back with my garden gloves was what my amore called ATLANTIS (click\u00c2\u00a0here<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0to see it on a video with Quicktime).<\/p>\n

Atlantis turned out to be the largest patty pan squash you have ever seen, or at least I have ever grown and eaten with delight.<\/p>\n

It was big enough to easily feed the both of us and I wanted to do something commemorative with it, to celebrate its large accomplishment and mine.\u00c2\u00a0 So I decided to fill it with a vegetable and quinoa medley and bake it.<\/p>\n

Now baking isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t something that I do that often anymore with vegetables as it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not half as healthy for you as steaming.\u00c2\u00a0 But in this case to cut up my big baby squash for steaming seemed to diminish it, and for me this was a celebration so it had to be like the stuffed turkey at a Thanksgiving dinner, the center piece of the meal.<\/p>\n

So here is what I did with it in steps, followed by what I used for the filling.<\/p>\n

1.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Cut squash along its side so that you end up with a nice base and a top.
\n2.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Take out seeds and any stringy like pieces you may find, but keep the meat.
\n3.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Set \u00e2\u20ac\u0153squash meat\u00e2\u20ac\u009d aside and chop up into pieces.
\n4.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 You should now have a half of a squash that looks like a bowl ready to be filled.
\n5.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Fill a pan (you may want to put a layer of foil down- do you know they sell recycled foil now) with some water and lay the squash on it with it sitting up.\u00c2\u00a0 You can put the top you cut off along its side to bake with the meat side up.<\/p>\n

Filling:<\/strong><\/p>\n

The filling can be anything that you find appealing to your sense that calls to you. If I had any leftover vegetables lying about in the fridge believe me they would be going in it.\u00c2\u00a0 But I had just gone to the market so I had already allocated my veggies for the week.\u00c2\u00a0 So I decided to just add a few green squash and some red peppers along with some spices. I chopped them up and added them to the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153squash meat\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.\u00c2\u00a0 Then I saut\u00c3\u00a9ed them together for under 5 minutes lightly with some vegetable broth, adding in some dry herbs and garlic.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 I then added some capers that I had drained and rinsed along with some olive oil.\u00c2\u00a0 I then added it to a bowl of cooked quinoa.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>I had prepared this part of the meal earlier in the day so that when I came home I wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have to do all of it at once.\u00c2\u00a0 I think it actually enhanced the meal because the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153squash meat\u00e2\u20ac\u009d mixture was able to sit and marinate for a while before I filled the squash.\u00c2\u00a0 To fill the squash I just gave the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153squash meat\u00e2\u20ac\u009d mixture a good spooning and then added it slowly to the empty round space of the squash.\u00c2\u00a0 Any left over filling I served with the squash.<\/p>\n

I accompanied this meal with some steamed kale and broccoli with garlic.\u00c2\u00a0 This meal reminded us of a simple dish for a summer\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s day.\u00c2\u00a0 It was an evening meal that was light, yet filling.\u00c2\u00a0 It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a great dish that you could use for a party, buying several small squash.\u00c2\u00a0 Each person can then have their own which could be served on a table with several different small dishes of other vegetables of the season for their choosing.
\nLet me know if your garden of veggies has inspired an ATLANTIS to sprout and end up on your table and how you enjoyed it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So this weekend I had a wonderful experience and experiment with my garden.\u00c2\u00a0 I woke up ready to water the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=104"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":113,"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104\/revisions\/113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/safaraf.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}