Paleo Spaghetti and Meat Sauce

Paleo Meat Sauce = yes!  Paleo pasta = how?

 I was pretty hesitant on trying this out.  I knew I could figure out an easy Paleo spaghetti meat sauce, but how do you replace pasta?  I had heard about the spaghetti squash, but frankly anything with the word 'squash' in it scares me!  I decided to jump in and even watched a video on what to do with the squash.  If you would like to view the video on allrecipes.com click here! 

This turned out to be an awesome dinner....even though I couldn't get Jesse to try it.  I'm not sure why he tried brussel sprouts (and liked them) but was too scared to try this?  He ended up eating the spaghetti sauce on Triscuits :)

1. Start by preheating your oven to 400 degrees.  Cut your spaghetti squash in half, lengthwise.  This alone should count as your workout for the day.  Good Lord it was hard to get that knife all the way thru it!  That should be a WOD of its own!  Next take a spoon and scoop out the inside mesh and seeds.

2. Place the two halves face down in a casserole dish and put just enough water in the pan to cover the bottom.  Cook for 40 minutes.

  
3. While the squash is cooking, dice 1 onion and 3 cloves of garlic and saute in a skillet.  Once they are cooked and clear, add 2 pounds of extra lean, hamburger meat and brown.

 4. Once the meat has cooked,  add these 3 cans of tomato sauce.  I chose one plain, and two flavored (roasted garlic / basic, garlic and oregano) to add to the taste of the spaghetti sauce.  All of these cans are all-natural and do not contain any preservatives, etc.

5.  Next add 1 tablespoon Italian seasoning and 1/2 tablespoon red pepper flakes.

6. I let mine simmer while I got the squash out of the oven.  I read that you are supposed to let the squash 'cool' before you fork it into spaghetti noodles, but who wants cold spaghetti noodles?  I let mine cool enough just to where I could touch the squash to work on it!  Turn it over and get your fork out!

7. Creating the fake pasta was amazing.  I had no idea it would work so well.  Just rake your fork along the inside and it literally shaves off in long, noodle like strips.  Here is a pile of my Paleo noodles made out of squash.

  

8.  Here is my finished product.  It was such a great change up besides having my typical meat and vegetable dinner.  It got me thinking about what else I could top this pasta with?!  Good luck and let me know how it goes.