Spaghetti Squash...Who Knew???

I am going to go out on a limb here and say that you CAN teach an old dog new tricks! Not that I am old, or a dog. But I CAN do new things!

I have never been very adventurous in my food choices. I grew up on meat and potatoes and peas…ugh…peas…sometimes all three in a dish my mom called “hamburger gravy” but I digress.

My mom hated garlic, my dad hated onions and black pepper is too hot for me. I know…..BORING! Boring and bland. That is what I grew up with. So once I moved out on my own, I survived on takeout (Mikes subs) and, once that relationship ended and I lived alone, egg noodles. Every. Damn. Day.

I was definitely food challenged, and health challenged for that matter. Well, not really health, but weight for sure. I have struggled with my weight all my life (but that is a whole OTHER story) Gratefully my health has been good despite the crap I put in my body (think 2l of diet coke a day!)

Fast forward a decade or so. Married, with 2 young children and a serious dislike for cooking. I did learn how to prepare a few dishes that they liked, submarines, mom’s macaroni, spaghetti etc. But still was not very experimental. I was so grateful for barbeque season because my husband was the griller and we grilled all the time. Yay!

Fast forward another decade…(old dog, right?) and now I am separated with 2 teenagers in the house. Still not a cooking fan but better than I was.

But over the last 3 months, I have changed….like, REALLY changed. I started Keto. I grew tired of my declining health and my steadily increasing weight and decided that I needed to change. Drastically.

The thing with Keto (other than giving up all sugar and most carbs) is you have to COOK! This was definitely one of the reasons I never wanted to do Keto.

So I found an amazing website to help me and coach me on what I needed to do to get healthy. Well the first 2 weeks were super easy! They had a challenge and told me what to eat. My co-workers were shocked and amazed that I was bringing my lunch, that I HAD COOKED MYSELF! Still, for the most part it was food that I was familiar with.

Then, something called for an avocado. AN AVOCADO! What the hell?? Never in my life had I eaten an avocado. They looked like….ya, you know.  And they were smushy, and green. Green smushy no less! I had to ask a girl at work how you cut one. (turns out it is pretty easy). Anyway, I had made the decision to change the way I ate and if an avocado was going to help me, then damnit, I was going to eat it. So I cut in and threw it in the dish I was preparing, added some salt and olive oil and omg, was it delish! I talked about the fact that I ate an avocado for WEEKS! No one cared. But I did! I was changing!

Now that I am used to avocado in my diet (I eat about 2 a week now!), it was time to try something new.

SPAGHETTI SQUASH! Ahhhhh! This was something I was sure I was going to mess up. The instructions were quite simple. Cut in half, scoop out seeds, olive oil and salt (my favourite combo!) and bake, cut side down for 40-60 mins in a 400 degree oven. Sounded too simple.

40 minutes later, I opened the oven to a perfectly done spaghetti squash. I honestly figured that in the spaghettifiying of the innards that it would all go to crap. But guess what? IT DIDN’T!! So onto my plate it went. Then I figured, ewww, I was going to hate it. Guess what?? I LOVED IT! Sooooo yummy!

I feel kinda gypped I have to say. 48 years old and I am just trying this now. I could have had lots of years with spaghetti squash, enjoying it’s golden yumminess.

I hear you out there, people who cook. People who cook and enjoy it. I hear you.

“Try new things” they say, “you will like it” they say.

Well they are right!

I wonder what amazing deliciousness is around the next corner.