Seafood Pesto Pasta

Tonight, Brent and I enjoyed a new experiment. We're calling it seafood pesto pasta. Last week, I made a pesto from scratch for a roasted chicken; we also had some scallops and shrimp in the freezer. So this weekend we bought a spaghetti squash and tonight we threw it all together.


Ingredients:

• 1 spaghetti squash
• 2 garlic cloves, pressed or minced
• 1 tablespoon ghee
• 8-10 scallops (uncooked)
• 3 cups of small shrimp (already cooked)
• 1/3 cup of pesto (homemade, if possible)

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Bake the spaghetti squash for 60 to 90 minutes, until tender (ours needed just 75 minutes).
3. Let the spaghetti squash cool for 10 to 20 minutes.
4. Cut the squash in half, length-wise. 
5. Scoop out and discard the seeds; then, package one half for use at another time. (Unless your squash is super small. We only needed half because ours was pretty big.)
6. Shred flesh of the remaining half of the squash into a bowl.
7. Melt the ghee over medium high heat in a pan.
8. Sauté the garlic in the ghee for about 1 to 2 minutes, until the garlic is fragrant. 
9. Sauté the shrimp in the garlic and ghee for about 3 to 4 minutes, until heated through.
10. Remove the shrimp from the pan and place in a bowl to the side. 
11. Sauté the scallops in the garlic and ghee for about 2 to 3 minutes per side, until cooked through.
12. Remove the scallops from the pan and place in the bowl with the shrimp. 
13. Toss the shrimp, scallops and shredded spaghetti squash with the pesto in a large bowl. 
14. Serve and enjoy!

This recipe is great to do together. While I handled cutting and shredding the spaghetti squash, Brent took care of the shrimp and scallops. 

It didn't take quite like I expected. The spaghetti squash was stronger in flavor than I expected, but it was still really good. Traditional pasta provides a bland, starchy canvass for pesto and any protein you add to it. Rather than the heaviness you find with pasta, the whole dish was light and yet still filling. 

We hope you find this as fun and delicious as we did.