Stripetti Spaghetti Squash Puttanesca Sided With Delicious Baked Salmon

Cindy and I are still making meals for two, she wanted to cook, and I recalled a piece of Norwegian Salmon in the freezer.  Then she remembered the squash we’ve had all winter and decided we should eat it with the fish.  We discussed several options for topping the squash and I decided to make up a puttanesca sauce for mine using the recipe below, which is a scaled down version of two sauces that we’ve made in the past. 

Stripetti Spaghetti Squash Puttanesca 

Ingredients:

1 Stripetti Spaghetti Squash

1 tbsp. olive oil

1/8 cup diced onion

2 cloves minced garlic

14 oz. canned tomatoes, pureed in the food processor

½ cup halved grape tomatoes

1/8 cup halved Kalamata olives

1/8 cup halved green olives

½ tablespoon tomato paste

½ tablespoon drained capers

½ tablespoon minced anchovy fillets - mine was heaped up a little

1/8 teaspoon dried crushed basil

1/4 teaspoon dried crushed red pepper flakes - heaped up for Bev’s taste

Salt if needed - I added none

½ cup halved grape tomatoes 

Directions: 

1. Preheat oven to 425°.

2. Slice spaghetti squash lengthwise, (yeah right) this thing had a very hard skin and my knife in my hand was a no-go.  I considered using a chain saw but settled on tapping the top of my knife with a hammer, which finally got it open.

3. Then scoop out and discard seeds. Drizzle cut sides with oil and season with salt and pepper.

4. Place squash cut-side down on a large, rimmed baking sheet. Roast until tender, 43 to 45 minutes. Let cool slightly. Using a fork, break up squash strands.  

While squash bakes: 

5. In a medium skillet, heat the olive oil over medium high heat.  Add the onion and cook until softened.

6. Add the garlic and cook an additional 2 minutes. 

7. Add the canned tomatoes and the remaining ingredients (except grape tomatoes) and simmer until the sauce is thickened and slightly reduced, about 30 minutes. 

8. Adjust seasoning, to taste. No additional salt required.

9. Stir in the grape tomatoes and cook about 10 more minutes.

10. Plate the squash and top with sauce and crumbled feta or grated Parmesan (if you can remember).

For the salmon, Cindy used the recipe for Best Easy Healthy Baked Salmon from Creme de la Crumb and I won't reproduce it here but you can get it by clicking on the link. 

The Verdict:

We both thought the salmon was delicious and would make this very simple recipe again.  We pulled ours from the oven at an internal temperature of 122F and it was flaky but still moist.  Cindy put butter and brown sugar on her squash (pic above) while I used the puttanesca sauce on mine, which worked very well. 

Photos can be enlarged by clicking on them and the blue words are links.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

Larry

03/09/23 meal date