Maple Glazed Acorn Squash

Here's a recipe I found on Food Wishes. Chef John has a great site chock full of recipes, videos, and lots of wonderful humor. I urge you to set aside several hours when you visit because you'll be tempted to click video after video after video.

So anyway, I had this acorn squash sitting around and decided to give it the Chef John treatment - oven roasted with a touch of fresh orange juice and glazed with brown sugar, butter, maple syrup, and a little cayenne.  Yum!.

Preheat oven to 400F. CAREFULLY cut the acorn squash in half lengthwise and scrape out the seeds (see hints below recipe).

Okay, now you carefully score the inside of the squash with 1/4-inch deep score marks; do this in a crisscross pattern. Place the squash in a baking dish and brush with freshly squeezed orange juice. Sprinkle with Kosher salt and bake for 30 minutes.

At the end of 30 minutes, make the glaze by combining the butter, brown sugar, maple syrup, and cayenne in a non-stick pan over med-high heat.

Boil the glaze for 1 full minute.

Brush the glaze all over the squash and return them to the 400F oven for 40 minutes. If your glaze starts to firm up before you use it, return it to the heat for just a moment.

When done, allow the squash to sit for a few minutes. The glaze will thicken as it pools in the bottom of each squash half; use a pastry brush to redistribute the glaze, season with salt and pepper. Serve.

Maple Glazed Acorn Squash

Printable Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 acorn squash, cut in half lengthwise and seeded

• 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed orange juice

• 1 1/2 teaspoons brown sugar

• pinch of kosher salt

• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter

• 1 tablespoon pure maple syrup

• pinch of cayenne pepper

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400F.

2. Place acorn halves in a baking dish and score each half 1/4-inch deep in a crisscross pattern; brush with orange juice and sprinkle lightly with kosher salt.

3. Bake uncovered for 30 minutes.

4. In a nonstick pan, make glaze by combining the brown sugar, butter, maple syrup, and cayenne for 1 full minute.

5. Remove squash from oven and brush with glaze; return to oven for another 40 minutes.

6. Remove from oven and rest for 5 minutes. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. adapted from foodwishes.com.

Note

• Cutting acorn squash can be risky business, but here are a couple ways to go about it safely.  1) you can stabilize the squash by nestling it down in your impeccably clean sink drain before you stab it with your razor sharp knife.  Or 2) you can bunch up a tea towel on your cutting board; making a well for the squash to nest in to keep it stable while you cut it.  Whatever you do, be sure to use a very sharp knife and keep your fingers well out of the way.