Sweet Roasted Acorn Squash

Most nights of the week my dinner plate consists of some mixture of veggies, grains, beans, and/or potatoes.  I consider them my cheap, healthy staples.  A few weeks ago  I had an acorn squash sitting around just begging to be cooked, so I decided to do something simple and add a few delicious ingredients.

Sweet Roasted Acorn Squash
you'll need:

• 1 acorn squash
• olive oil
• salt to taste
• 1/2 stick of butter
• 1/4 cup of brown sugar

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. 

First, cut your squash in half and scoop out the seeds.

Cut squash into slices.  I did not cut off the rind, but if you're feeding this to kids you may want to take the extra step to cut it off the rind.  Place in a baking dish, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt, and roast for 20 minutes.

While the squash is roasting, mix softened butter and brown sugar together to create a paste.

After 20 minutes of roasting, take squash out of oven and spread 1 tablespoon of paste onto each slice.

Roast again for 10 minutes.  At this point, the brown sugar butter will have melted into a sauce.  Using a brush, spread the now sauce back onto the squash slices.  Bake for 10 more minutes.

When finished roasting, serve with whatever you'd like!  Make sure you spoon some of the melted brown sugar butter sauce from the bottom of the pan on to the slices.  I have no regrets about using butter when I eat a plate of vegetables and fiber most nights of the week.  Everything in moderation!

I would imagine this would taste great with any variety of squash and on sweet potatoes as well-- kind of like the cinnamon sugar butter sweet potatoes they serve at Texas Roadhouse, if you've ever been.  

Happy December!