Spiced lamb stuffed kabocha squash
Ingredients
Preheat oven to 400*. Cut squash in half and remove seeds. Drizzle a little olive oil onto the flesh of the squash. Line a cookie sheet with aluminum foil and place the squash flesh-side down on it. Place in oven and cook for about 30 minutes. Check for doneness and continue to bake until the squash is tender when pricked with a fork.
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Heat a large, heavy pan on medium-high. Add about a tablespoon of the olive oil and cook the lamb until it crumbly. Remove the lamb to a bowl, leaving the fat. Dispose of the fat--I just used a wad of paper towels to do this step. Add about a tablespoon of olive oil into the pan and add the onion and garlic. Saute until the onion is starting to get transparent and then add the tomato paste, cumin, coriander, cinnamon and chipotle and cook until the mixture becomes very fragrant--about a minute.
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Add the chicken stock to the spice and onion mixture and stir to combine. Bring the mixture to a simmer and cook for a few minutes until it begins to thicken a little. Add the lamb back to the mixture and bring to a boil. Let simmer, uncovered for 10-15 minutes, stirring frequently, until the liquid has been absorbed and the mixture is creamy and thickened. Add mint and cilantro--preferably fresh.
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While the meat mixture is cooking, place the pine nuts in a small pan and heat over medium-high heat until the nuts become toasty and golden-brown. When golden-brown, add to the meat mixture and stir to combine.
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Remove baked squash from oven and increase oven temperature to 450*. Fill squash with meat mixture and top with bread or panko crumbs and return to oven. Bake for a few more minutes until the topping is browned. Serve with a crunchy, green salad and nice glass of merlot.
Note
Here's a fun fact about this recipe! As mentioned above, the first time I made this recipe was at the end of a farmer's market haul challenge week, and I really wanted to stick to the letter and spirit of the challenge: namely, using only what I had gotten that week at the farmer's market and not cheating by racing to the grocery store for a missing ingredient. I wanted to use mint and cilantro in the meat mixture. The cilantro was not a big problem--I had it dried in my spice cabinet. But I had no mint anywhere. And then I remembered that I had peppermint tea:
I broke open the teabag, and--viola! peppermint leaves! Ha! Desperation really is the mother of invention!!
