Feed Your Kale Addiction – Recipe #3

Hello October!!! Football, pumpkin spice candles, colorful foliage and gourds adorning porches make me giddy. The cooler weather also fuels my culinary fire so I thought it was time to add to the Feed Your Kale Addiction list of recipes. I hit the super highway and found a recipe for spaghetti squash pesto with kale. It sparked my interest and had everything in the fridge. Yay me!

Ingredients:

• 1 ½ cups kale, leaves chopped & stems removed
• 1 spaghetti squash, halved lengthwise & seeded

• 1 small yellow or white onion, diced
• 2 large beefsteak tomatoes, diced
• ¾ – 1 cup of your favorite mushrooms, diced
• 1 teaspoon garlic salt
• 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning OR equal parts oregano, thyme, basil & marjoram
• EVOO
• 2 tablespoons prepared pesto OR see pesto recipe below
• ¼ – ½ cup grated three cheese blend (asiago, parmesan & fontina)
  • You can never have too much cheese
• sea salt & black pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 °F. Cover baking sheet with cooking spray.
2. Lightly cover fleshy part of spaghetti squash with EVOO and sprinkle with a dash of sea salt & black pepper. You can also add a little garlic powder if you’re a garlic lover like I am.
3. Place squash skin side down on prepared baking sheet. Bake until cooked through, about 45 minutes – 1 hour. You DON’T want to overcook the squash, so keep an eye on it. Remove from oven; and let cool. Once squash is cool enough to handle, scrape flesh into string-like strands with a fork. Place in a bowl and set aside.
4. Over medium-high heat, sauté onion. Stir in kale, tomatoes and mushrooms; reduce heat to medium low.
5. Stir in squash, garlic salt and Italian seasoning; cook for 5 minutes. Remove from stove and place squash mixture in a large bowl.
6. Stir a bit more EVOO and pesto into the squash mixture. Slowly add grated three cheese blend, stirring until evenly mixed.

Should you be adventurous – here’s a super easy pesto recipe.

Pesto Ingredients:

• ¼ cup pine nuts
• 3 cloves garlic
• 1 ½ cups fresh basil leaves
• ½ cup EVOO
• 1 pinch ground nutmeg
• sea salt & pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Place pine nuts on a cookie sheet, and bake for 10 minutes or until lightly toasted.
2. In a food processor, combine everything and process until a coarse paste is formed.

I know that not everyone likes to cook, but this recipe is SO easy to prepare and you could double up when making pesto and freeze what you don’t need.

It comes naturally for me to explore healthy recipes that provide quality ingredients and low carbs. This is important as a T1D, because I may not be able to control my diabeetus, but I can control what I put in my body. I feel so much better when I cook and hope this recipe inspires you. I’ld love to hear your feedback or adjustments to this recipe – please share below and include a photo. I LOVE photos.

Want more kale in your life? Check out Feed You Kale Addiction – Recipe #1 and #2.