Pesto Chicken Spaghetti Squash

I love to cook. It's my thing, I feel most like myself when I am baking or cooking. I love baking/cooking new recipes and well, my friends know it too. A lot of my close friends say, "I don't know how you cook every night," but for me cooking is not a chore. Doing laundry is a chore, but not cooking. Since many of my friends know how much I love to cook, they usually tell me all the yummy recipes that they have tried and I become inspired.

Recently, I became inspired with Spaghetti Squash. One of my close friends, Tania, tried it and she called me to tell about it. I could not believe it, a squash that when baked turned into spaghetti like noodles? I had to try it. I did :) The first time I made it, I microwaved it, didnt turn out like I imagined. So this time I baked it and it was AWESOME! So excited to share this recipe it was inspired by paleOMG, but I made it my own :)

1 spaghetti squash (medium size)

1/2 lb to 1 lb chicken tender loins, cut in cubes (1/2 lb is the right amount, but in my house, that would only be enough for Anthony)

1/4 cup Classico pesto sauce (if you want to make the pesto from scratch use: 1 1/2 cups of fresh basil leaves, 2 garlic cloves, 1/2 cup of olive oil and put it in the food process) 

Juice of 1 lemon 

1 table spoon of ground flax seed (optional)

Salt & pepper to taste

1. Pre-heat your oven to 425 degrees

2. Cut the squash in half length-wise, take out all the seeds and excess strings (in case you don't know, this squash is hard. Cutting it in half might make you break a sweat if you don't have a good knife, which in our case we don't.) Place the squash on a baking sheet up side down and cook for 25 minutes or until the squash is soft to the touch. 

3. If you are making the sauce from scratch this would be the time to mix everything in the food processor. I used the Classico pesto in the little jar. Add the lemon juice to the pesto sauce and mix together. 

4. Heat a large skillet with a little bit of olive oil. Place the chicken in the skillet with some salt & pepper. Cook the chicken on both sides, when the chicken is close to done add the pesto mix to the chicken. 

5. Coat the chicken with the pesto. 

6. When the spaghetti squash is done cooking and it has cooled a bit, using a fork pull the threads from all around the spaghetti squash and add them to the chicken and pesto in the pan. 

7. Serve it in a bowl and sprinkle some ground flax seed on it.

The picture does not do it justice. It was really good and best of all healthy as can be. Of course, it doesn't exactly taste like noodles, but it is a great replacement. High in fiber and low in carb :) Love it! Thank you Tania for helping me discover this yummy vegetable.