>(Nancy Dooley)
>
>"Marge" wrote:
>
>> I never ate acorn squash before so I'm trying that too. Thought I'd try
>> cooking it in the microwave, then add the brown sugar, butter.
>
>The Microwave is energy efficient, but I do mine in the oven - better
>flavor, I think. Spray a sheet of aluminum foil with Pam, put it on a
>cookie sheet, put half an acorn squash cut-side down on it and bake it
>at 400 for about 45 minutes or until it is done. Serve with lots of
>butter, salt & pepper. Yum.

Baking cut side down results in steamed squash, very moist, watery actually...
and seasoning runs off into the pan, creating a mess resulting in pans needing
soaking and scrubbing... may as well nuke. I prefer to bake winter squash cut
side up, with the cavity seasoned, results in a drier, firmer flesh, and
concentrates the flavor, and also is far less messy, no pan to scrub.
Sometimes all I do is place a small dab of butter in the cavity and sprinkle
with some s n' p. Other times I prefer something sweeter, I'll place some
raisins, prunes, whatever fresh/dried fruit in the cavity, with a little butter
and a sprinkle of cinnamon. I've tried filling the cavity with crumbled
sausage but don't much care for that rendition... I'd rather have the meat
entree cooked separately. My favorite method for cooking winter squash (summer
squash too) is on the grill, then I will begin cut side down, and flip cut side
up to season and finish cooking. I prefer my winter squash a bit on the dry
side, if I wanted it dribbly moist I'd buy little jars of Gerbers/Beechnut. I
like winter squash well baked, so it's skin crisps and can be eaten... I like
butternut better than acorn, its skin is also less fiberous. Butternut is also
easier to grow, and produces far larger fruit... larger acorn gets quite
stringy. I try to pick butternut before they top five pounds, otherwise they
are just too unwieldly, but often a few have been known to hide and I have
ended up with 20 pounders... those are best chunked and slooow grilled to make
vegetarian smoked gouda.


---= BOYCOTT FRANCE (belgium) GERMANY--SPAIN =---
---= Move UNITED NATIONS To Paris =---
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