Baked Acorn Squash

I’ve been wracking my brain, trying to come up with a dinner recipe using this acorn squash.  We got it at a local farm and it’s been sitting in the fridge looking to be eaten.  In the end I decided to make it the way that my husband loved it as kid.  He convinced me to post about it because despite it’s simplicity, it’s worth being showcased. 

09Baked Acorn Squash

I can never remember which squash is which.  Let’s be realistic here, there are tons of different kinds and a lot of them look kind of similar.  They are all squash after all.  My husband taught me a little trick.  An acorn squash looks like an acorn.  Until he pointed out the obvious source of the name I’d never actually noticed.

Once you cut them open they kind of smell like pumpkin.  Has anyone else noticed that?  The pumpkin like guts have to be removed and a “grapefruit spoon” is super handy for doing the scooping.  Look at me being creative.  😉

04Baked Acorn Squash

Everyone’s always looking for a simple side dish, right?  Especially with Thanksgiving right around the corner.  These pretty things are a little buttery, a little sweet, and a lot of delicious.  It’s amazing how scrumptious these turn out, especially when you consider how ridiculously easy they were to put together.  My husband was right in suggesting I share these with you.  🙂

08Baked Acorn Squash

Since I whipped these up in no time at all, I decided to play around with the photography.  If you’re not a photo bug, you can skip the technical jargon and enjoy the pictures and the recipe.

If you’re a photo bug then I’m sure you’ve heard of a macro lens.  They are the fun lenses that let you get super close to things and see details that you’d never be able to see with your eyes.   But, have you heard of extension tubes?  They attach to any lens and help it to act like an actual macro lens but at a fraction of the cost.  My husband let me borrow his Kenko Extension Tube set to play around with them.

I’ve never used an actual macro lens so I don’t know how they compare to using extenders.  I can say that the extenders that I used are vastly cheaper.  They are even cheaper in comparison to lenses for full frame sensor cameras.  (Unless you like cropping all of your pictures out of circle pictures all the time I suppose.)  Perhaps if you want to try them out or don’t think you’ll use this feature often, then the extenders might be the way to go.  (My husband obviously thought so since he has had these for years and doesn’t own any macro lenses in his impressive collection.)

I took the next two photos with the 12mm extender.  Cool shot of the water drops.

02Baked Acorn Squash_12mm

The depth of field is intentionally narrow here.  Meaning, most of the photo will be blurry and if you like that sort of thing like I do then this is a pretty cool photo that highlights the crust.

11Baked Acorn Squash_12mm

I took the below photo with the 36mm extender.  How crazy is that detail?  I had to get my lens so close to it that I was almost touching the fabric.

03Baked Acorn Squash_36mm

As a food blogger, I’m not sure a “macro lens” is all that great.  I could see it being fun if you like taking super close ups of flowers or bug eyeballs or something.  

If you’re a food blogger, have you used one?  If so, which one and do you like it?  I found it to be great fun to play around with, but it took a very long time to get the pictures and I wasn’t impressed with the overall results.  (A lot of the pictures were simply unusable.)

10Baked Acorn Squash

Baked Acorn Squash Recipe
(About 2 to 4 servings)

Ingredients:

  • 1 acorn squash
  • 1 tablespoon butter
  • 2 tablespoons brown sugar
  • 2 teaspoons maple syrup

Directions:

  1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
  2. Line a baking sheet with tin foil and set it aside.
  3. Cut the acorn squash in half lengthwise and remove the seeds.
  4. With a sharp knife, score the insides of the acorn squash halves in a cross-hatch pattern.
  5. Place 1/2 tablespoon of butter into each half of the squash.
  6. Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of brown sugar into of each half.
  7. Drizzle 1 teaspoon of maple syrup into each half.
  8. Place the acorn squash, cut side up (so it’s like a bowl with butter, sugar and syrup in it) on the prepared baking sheet and bake it in the preheated oven for about 1 hour.
  9. When you remove the acorn squash from the oven the stuff you put in them will have turned into a sort of sauce.  Use a spoon to drizzle it around on the inside of the squash.

Source:  Simple Recipes

 

Rating:

4 Hats

 

Here are some other sexy side dishes.

Green Beans with Tomatoes

07Green Beans With Tomatoes

Mashed Cauliflower

Mashed Cauliflower

Roasted Potatoes

05Roasted_Potatoes_1024x768

Comments

  1. Gorgeous photos… I love the simplicity!

    1. Tina says:

      Thank you so much!!

  2. Wow, I love the simplicity of this recipe. Looks so good! And thanks for the tip on using a grape fruit spoon. I’ve never thought of that and I always struggle to get the seeds out with an ordinary spoon.
    And the photos are gorgeous! You are very good with that lens 🙂

    1. Tina says:

      I’m so glad I mentioned the grapefruit spoon! Thank you so much for your lovely compliments. 🙂

  3. I would DIE to own a macro lens—supposedly it gives your photos a tack-sharp quality. 🙂 You know what else I wish was in front of me? This squash. Acorn squash is one of my fall-favorites and I love this simple baked version!

    1. Tina says:

      Love this simplicity too! 🙂

  4. NO way!! My sister in law just made acorn squash for us last week!! It was soooo delicious!! Just perfectly simple and enjoyable this time of year!! I need to start making more squash!! I love all kinds, spaghetti, acorn, butternut!! YUM! Lovely pictures btw!! They turned out beautiful!!

    1. Tina says:

      Thank you, kindly! 🙂

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *