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Lentil and Buckwheat Stuffed Acorn Squash Rings

January 6, 2025 by Ella

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Hello my friends and welcome to another beautiful and delicious recipe post! :)

I’ve been embracing squash season fully and I’m having so much fun trying new recipes with these beauties. These French Lentil & Buckwheat Stuffed Acorn Squash Rings are something I threw together super quickly but it ended up being such a WOW dish that I knew I had to share.

These Acorn Squash Rings are filled with the tastiest toppings that are super healthy and taste great ~ there’s lentils, buckwheat, dried cranberries, toasted pine nuts, spinach, balsamic glaze and pomegranate arils. All these flavours combined create a divine taste when paired up with the baked squash underneath.

Feel free to change up the ingredients to what you have on hand, for example if you don’t have buckwheat, use quinoa or brown rice instead.

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How to bake Acorn Squash:

Directions

Preheat oven to 325 F degrees.

Drizzle grape seed oil on a parchment-lined rimmed baking sheet.

Hold the acorn squash on its side on a cutting board and using a sharp serrated knife slice off about 3/4″ off one side. Then, cut again, then again to make 3 even clean slices. (This could get a bit tricky, and the pieces could not come out very even – don’t worry. Just go back and trim off uneven portions as best you can to make them lay down flat.

Some pieces will not be fully filled with squash so I went in with a pairing knife and cut that part out to make all the rings hollow so that they cook evenly and also so that the filling fits, of course.

Scoop out seeds and discard those.

Set squash rings on the prepared sheet and brush with more oil. Sprinkle some sea salt and pepper and thyme on top.

Bake for about 25-30 minutes. Being sure to flip them over half-way through. (In the meantime, you can prepare the filling.)

Remove from oven and fill with stuffing. (It should be ready by now).

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Keep the trimmed parts and end pieces and bake them too – those are great to add to a salad or leave uncooked and add to another recipe like this Squash Apple Soup:)

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This healthy acorn squash recipe is naturally gluten-free, grain-free (because buckwheat is not a grain), and vegan. You can easily swap out the buckwheat and replace with a quinoa or brown rice or farro – depending on what you have on hand. I used buckwheat because it’s what I already had some leftover buckwheat – which was really the inspiration for this dish… I was like, what do I do with this buckwheat??? ;) I saw the two acorn squashes on the counter and voilà – this happened! :)

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Lentil Buckwheat Stuffed Acorn Squash Rings

Ingredients:

1 acorn squash

1 cup buckwheat, cooked

1 sm can lentils, drained

1 small onion, diced

1 cup spinach, chopped

1/4 cup dried cranberries

2 tablespoons balsamic glaze

1/4 cup pine nuts

1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

1/2 teaspoon dried basil

salt and pepper to taste

grapeseed oil for cooking

fresh thyme for plating

1/4 cup pomegranate arils for plating

Directions:

Cook the acorn squash rings as per instructions above.
In a saucepan, sauté the onion with grapeseed oil until golden. Add in the buckwheat and lentils and spinach and stir often. Add a little water if the mixture starts to stick to the pan. Add in balsamic vinaigrette. Season with thyme and basil and salt and pepper to taste. Stir in cranberries.
For serving, place the squash rings on a flat plate and top with the lentil mixture. Top with pine nuts, pomegranate arils and fresh thyme.

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This dish was so amazing! I love how versatile squash is and also…. how gorgeous???

The flower shaped rings from this Acorn Squash make me just so happy! I LOVE when food looks beautiful – food should always be gorgeous because we eat with our eyes first! We really do… and this presentation is so beautiful for all your senses. Your eyes, your nose and taste buds are in for a treat! And the pomegranate arils look like jewels that top off this dish.

I hope you’ll enjoy this soon. It’s a lovely dish to make for your family or friends and makes it great for a buffet table or makes a great Thanksgiving recipe.

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Pure Ella Ella Leche profile photo
Ella Leché is a cookbook author (‘Cut the Sugar‘), recipe developer, and photographer/stylist behind Pure Ella; where she shares delicious and healthy recipes. Eating PURE is clean ingredients, whole foods, plant-based nourishment and delicious desserts – with quality ingredients and sweeteners so they’re treats with benefits so you won’t have to feel deprived or restricted to eat healthier.
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Filed Under: Dinner, Gluten-Free, Side Dishes, Vegan Tagged With: acorn squash, balsamic vinaigrette, buckwheat, dried cranberries, fall, gluten free, lentils, pine nuts, pomegranate, side dish, squash, thanksgiving, vegan, vegetarian

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Comments

  1. Gem (breakfastandsalads) says

    November 1, 2017 at 12:17 am

    I thought I was over my pumpkin/squash cravings until I saw your photos. I recently made miso pumpkin soup, totally irrelevant to this picture but it was soooo delicious. Will have to try out your recipe here, it looks filling and nutritious for a good stay-in dinner!

    My recipe for the miso pumpkin soup in case you are interested:
    https://breakfastandsalads.wordpress.com/2016/10/27/healing-miso-pumpkin-soup/

  2. Tanya Lenzner says

    November 1, 2017 at 8:41 pm

    I love this recipe! I’ve made it twice and the second time I used a few different ingredients in the filling as I didn’t have everything on hand. They were still delicious and look so complicated although it couldn’t be simpler. Thank you!

  3. Klozet Kapağı says

    November 26, 2017 at 1:44 pm

    Thanks for the recipe, I will try it out soon.

Welcome to Pure Ella! I share delicious and nourishing plant-based wheat and/or gluten-free recipes that are always pure and natural! ps. I wrote a book about how you can cut sugar the healthy way so you don't feel deprived! YOU will love it! Click below to check it out! Thank YOU for all your support and for being here and embracing a healthier & happier life! xo ella

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Ella Leché

Blogger, Recipe Developer, Photographer and Author. Loves healthy food, photography, sunshine and dancing in the kitchen with her two daughters. Read More…

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