Spaghetti with Roasted Winter Squash & Sun Dried Tomatoes

Last night I was going to make Thai Cashew Chicken and then I realized I didn't have any anchovies, so I went down stairs to the little store in my apartment block and found to my dismay that they didn't have any anchovies.

They did however have some nice winter squash and some lovely Mandarin oranges which were going for 0.85 centimos/ 1 kg so I bought these and made Tianshui Inspired Stir-fried Pork instead. I'll share the recipe with you at some point but it's something I made based on memories of something I ate for lunch when I was in a remote western area of China years ago.

Anyhow, today I've made another adaptation of one of Ilva's recipes from Lucullian Delights. It's a modified version of Pasta with Oven Roasted Butternut Squash, Cauliflower, Sundried Tomatoes and Rosemary.

Of course, I just had to make this after I found this lovely sweet squash sitting there on the shelf whispering to me: Eat me! Eat me!

I really love the idea of roasting squash and making it into a pasta sauce and if you haven't tried any variations of this yet - you'll be surprised at how rich and full-bodied this sauce is. Who needs to eat meat if vegetables can taste like this?

Well, I'm just kidding - I'm pretty carnivorous - but well, you know - I do my best to eat more vegetables than I really want to and since I'm going to eat them anyway I want them to be delicious and since Ilva seems to have a lot of nice solutions for precisely this, I'm an avid fan of her blog.

I recommend you try Ilva's original recipe because her recipe is healthier and better. Mine is the short and dirty version even though you have to roast the squash longer!


Ingredients

200g Spaghetti Barilla No. 5

1/2 Medium to Small Sized Squash

4 Sundried Tomatoes (Oil Cured)

Rosemary (fresh or dried use whichever you have)

1/2 Small Red Onion (don't put too much of this or it will be overpowering)

Salt

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Dried Red Chili

Black Pepper

Step 1: Preheat the oven to 250 C/482 F.

Step 2: Cube the squash into bite sized pieces and lay them in a casserole dish. Slice the onion thinly into about 1 inch or so and put these in the dish with the squash.

Step 3: Sprinkle salt, black pepper, chili on the squash and onions and drizzle with extra virgin olive oil.

Step 4: Put this in the oven and bake for 35 minutes.

Step 5: Slice the sun dried tomatoes into bite-sized slivers and put them in the casserole dish with the squash after the first 35 min. and roast for another 10 min.

Step 6: During the last 10 min. time the boiling of your pasta so that your spaghetti is ready when the squash is ready.

Step 7: Mix the spaghetti with the roasted squash mixture and enjoy!

Serves 2 - but these are small portions and if this is all you're going to eat including dessert, you'll need to increase the amount of squash and pasta.