Acorn squash that has just been cooked is combined with savory and sweet quinoa before being placed into the shell.
| Prep Time: | 20 mins |
| Cook Time: | 50 mins |
| Total Time: | 1 hr 10 mins |
| Servings: | 2 |
| Yield: | 2 servings |
Ingredients
- 1 large acorn squash, halved and seeded
- 1 ½ cups water
- 1 cup quinoa
- ¼ cup chopped prunes
- ¼ cup chopped raisins
- ¼ cup chopped dried apricots
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger
- 1 tablespoon olive oil, or to taste
- salt to taste
- ¼ cup chopped pecans
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Place acorn squash cut-side down in a baking pan.
- Bake acorn squash in the preheated oven until tender when pierced with a fork, 30 to 40 minutes. Flip to face up and cool until easily handled.
- Bring water and quinoa to a boil in a saucepan. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, covered, for 10 minutes. Stir in prunes, raisins, apricots, garlic, and ginger. Cook until prunes, raisins, and apricots plump up and quinoa is tender, about 5 minutes.
- Drizzle olive oil over quinoa mixture and add salt; mix well.
- Scoop flesh of the acorn squash from the shells; cut into cubes and toss gently with quinoa mixture. Stuff empty shells with mixture. Sprinkle pecans on top.
- Substitute walnuts for the pecans if desired.
Reviews
I made this recipe tonight. Since there were just a few reviews, I did my own thing and this dish came out wonderful! I did make changes based on what I had. I used craisins instead of raisins; I used more grated ginger and 2 cloves of minced garlic. I used a nectarine in lieu of apricots. I made the 1 C quinoe w/ 2 cups of water. I mixed everything (including the somewhat soft squash) in the cooked quinoe. YUM!
this quinoa -stuffed acorn squash was easy to make but the flavors did not stand out much. the water to quinoa ratio was very low and i had to keep adding more especially after the dried fruit soaked up quite a bit. my quinoa (from aldi) requires 2 c of water for every cup of quinoa. i had to keep adding water for the quinoa to properly uncurl and cook. it was really difficult to cube the squash after cooking and use care when scooping it out of the skin. the skin is thin and will tear easily. dont skimp on the salt. also the fresh grated ginger and garlic flavors were very muted so add a bit more if you want to really taste those. this was interesting to make and try. probably not a repeat for us.
This is delicious! I make it all the time now but don’t bother to restuff the shells just put it in a bowl!
I altered the ingredients to make this a vegan meal but stuck to basic idea. I used vegan mozzarella cheese in place of ricotta and used about 1 cup. I used quinoa in place of rice because it has more moisture. I omitted half and half. it came out great and is very flavorful. It also presents nice and impresses company.