On Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, we have many symbolic foods that our family eats and makes blessings on during the Rosh Hashanah seder including gourd, dates, leeks, pomegranate, black-eyed peas, swiss chard, fish head, lamb head, a “new” fruit which is sometimes a star fruit, and of course the apple and honey.

The hebrew word for gourd, kara “קרע”, resembles the word karaa, which means to rip. When we eat and bless the gourd, we are asking that the evil of our verdicts be ripped, and that our merits be announced.

It is traditional to find this candied gourd during Rosh Hashanah in Sephardic households, especially Syrian households. We prefer to use spaghetti squash in my family as it is more accessible than gourd and it tastes delicious. It is also very sweet since we hope for a sweet new year!

Candied Spaghetti Squash

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1/2 spaghetti squash

1 cup water

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon rose water

Fill pot with water and boil.

Cut squash in half, scoop out pits, and discard the pits. Place half of the spaghetti squash into boiling water on one side for 15 minutes. Then carefully flip it over to boil on the other side for another 15 minutes. Take out and let sit until cool enough to handle.

Scrape the insides of the cooked spaghetti squash with a fork into a bowl and set aside. Once cool enough to handle, squeeze out any excess liquid from the squash.

Make the honey by boiling 1 cup sugar and 1 cup water together. Simmer for about 10-15 minutes until it becomes a little bit thick. Add rose water.

Keep a steady simmer on the honey and add the spaghetti squash to the honey and stir around. Let simmer for 5-7 minutes. Carefully remove the spaghetti squash from the liquid honey and let plate it. Serve at room temperature.

Enjoy and please share any comments or questions you may have. I would love to see how yours turns out! Make sure to tag me @lizskosherkitchen if you share it on social media so I can see your masterpiece!