Spaghetti Squash Spaghetti

It's a new year and with a new year come new resolutions. Everyone aims to lose weight in January. It's the time that we focus on working out and gym sales go sky high. To help you all on your weight loss journey, I'm giving you a month of low calorie and healthy meals -- starting with this: It's a basic spaghetti but we are substituting pasta for squash. 

1 cup of squash is only 42 calories. 1 cup of cooked pasta is around 220 calories. And let's be honest - have you actually measured out one cup of pasta? You're probably eating more like 2 cups if you're not measuring; therefore, eating closer to 440 calories. Subbing the pasta for squash saves the average eater nearly 400 calories! Even though I've made this before, I found the recipe on the Food Network site; however, I altered the portions and omitted olive oil. Also, all you Italians out there that would NEVER use prepped marinara are free to use your own homemade marinara.

Ingredients
1 whole spaghetti squash
Gray salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 cups prepared (jarred) marinara sauce

6 oz lean ground beef (90/10)
1/4 c green pepper, diced (optional)

Directions
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.

Split the squash in half and scrape out seeds. Line an oven tray with aluminum foil. Season the spaghetti squash with salt, and pepper. Place flesh side down and roast for 30 to 40 minutes until fully cooked. Remove from the oven and let rest until cool enough to handle.

Spray a frying pan with cooking spray and saute the green peppers for about 3 minutes. Set aside.

Cook ground beef in the frying pan. Add marinara sauce when meat is cooked through. Cook for another few minutes on low.

When squash is cool enough to handle, using a large kitchen spoon scrape the strands of squash from the inside of the skin. Toss the spaghetti squash (and peppers if used) in the pan with the hot marinara for just long enough to get hot. Serve and enjoy.