Breakfast/Dinner Tonight

When I woke up this evening, I didn’t feel like making dinner/breakfast.  I went to sleep late after spending all morning seasoning and vacuum sealing meats to sous vide for the coming week so the last thing I wanted to do was to cook something else. 

But, then again, I didn’t feel like eating leftovers because that’s all I eat in the middle of the night.  Sigh.  It’d be nice not to care about what I eat.  So after all the bitching and complaining, I prepared some delicata squash stuffed with spiced grassfed ground beef and tomatoes and served them with some sauteed swiss chard:

And it only took around 30 minutes.  Here’s how I tackled this meal:

Delicata Squash Stuffed with Spiced Meat and Tomatoes (serves 2) and a side of Sauteed Chard

Ingredients:

• 1 large delicata squash (or two small ones)
• 1 large onion
• 1 lb ground meat (I used grassfed beef)
• 4 small Roma tomatoes
• 4-5 garlic cloves
• 2-3 tsps of The Food Lovers’ Primal Palate Homemade Taco Seasoning (this blog is awesome, btw!)
• extra virgin olive oil
• ¼ C shredded Cheddar cheese (I know it’s not Paleo but I like dairy)
• 1 bunch of chard, stems removed

First things first, I preheated the toaster oven to broil.  Then, I washed the delicata squash (since I like eating the skin), trimmed off the ends, and cut it in half lengthwise.  After scooping out the seeds and slime in the middle, I cut the squash in half crosswise (yielding 4 pieces).  I drizzled the cut-side of the squash with extra virgin olive oil and seasoned to taste with salt and pepper.  Then, I put the squash in one layer, cut-side down, in a Pyrex baking dish tightly covered in plastic wrap.  I nuked the squash on high for ~5 minutes, re-arranged the squash (the middle ones don’t cook as quickly as the ones on the sides in my microwave), re-applied plastic wrap, and nuked for 4-5 more minutes until the squash was fully cooked.

While the squash was cooking in the microwave, I finely chopped  the onion in my Cuisinart, squeezed 3 garlic cloves through my garlic press, and diced my tomatoes.  I threw together the taco seasoning (switched out smoked paprika for regular, and coriander for cumin) and then fired up a large cast iron skillet on the stove at medium-high. 

I glugged some olive oil in the pan and sauteed the onions until translucent.  Then, I added the minced garlic and moved that around for about 30 seconds and then plopped in my ground beef.  Once the beef was no longer pink, I added 2-3 tsp of the taco seasoning and chopped tomatoes.  I seasoned the meat with salt and pepper to taste and let the meat simmer until the tomatoes broke down a little.

While the meat simmered, I washed some chard and squeezed a couple cloves of garlic through the garlic press.  I took the squash out of the microwave but noticed that they had been flattened by the vacuum created in the tightly sealed dish.  No biggie.  I don’t friggin’ care how something looks as long it tastes good.  Just be careful when you remove the plastic wrap because the steam can really scorch you.  Yes, I know plastic wrap might be harmful when microwaved but sometimes I like to live dangerously.  If you don’t want to microwave the squash – you can bake it in the oven for ~40 minutes.

I lined a small baking sheet with foil and put the cooked squash cut-side up on it.  Then, I scooped some of the seasoned meat and piled it on the squash.  You may have leftover meat which, to me, is always a bonus.  I topped the stuffed squash with some pre-shredded cheddar cheese and popped the tray into my pre-heated toaster oven for ~5 minutes  (until the cheese melts and browns).  While I waited for the squash to broil, I sauteed the chard and garlic in some extra virgin olive oil and seasoned to taste with some salt and pepper.

Yum-o.  Ick.  I swear I will never use a Rachel Ray-ism again.  I would much rather type out E-X-T-R-A V-I-R-G-I-N O-L-I-V-E O-I-L instead of using the initials E-V-O-O.  Even if my fingers were chopped off and I was typing with my nose.