My husband loves pasta.  As you may recall, he’s also diabetic, so he can’t really have it.  So, one day while prepping squash for a dish, I realized that if you keep using the peeler on the squash, it kind of looks like pasta ribbons.  So, I tried it.  I used my peeler on the flesh of the squash and made very pretty ribbons.  I stopped when I reached the seeds of the squash.  I sautéed the  ribbons in butter and a bit of olive oil with salt.  I then used them like pasta with tomato sauce and Italian sausage.

While they don’t taste like pasta, as squash is a bit sweeter, the look and mouth feel was very similar to a wide pasta like pappardelle.  And, as a bonus, the kids got to eat a vegetable!

Tomato sauce has been around since the importation of the tomato to the “old world” in the 1500s.  While at first considered poisonous due to its relation to the nightshade family, eventually the tomato was widely adopted with the Italians leading the way.  My sauce recipe is really simple, please use your favorite sauce, if you have one:  sauté in olive oil 1 medium onion (small dice).  When onion is translucent, add 3 cloves of minced garlic.  Add 1 teaspoon of dried oregano and 1 teaspoon of dried basil and 1 bay leaf.   Sauté until fragrant.  Add 1 33 ounce can of crushed tomatoes and simmer for 30 minutes.   Salt and pepper to taste.  If the sauce is too thin, add a tablespoon of tomato paste and stir.  If it is still too thin, repeat.  For the Italian sausage, I sauté in heated olive oil until almost done and throw into the sauce to finish.