Zucchini. Everyone wonders what to do with zucchini. Well, if you grow our Striato d'Italia or other zucchini varieties, you won't have to wonder how to get rid of them. They taste good, so they go quickly. Secondly, you treat them like an Italian. Eat lots of the zucchini flowers (prevent a zuke); pick them when small, no more than five inches and they are nice even smaller. For the bigger ones (up to 8 inches or so), go to # 3 below.
1. For the flowers, simply pick them when they are open, remove the stamens inside the flower, dip them in beaten egg, dredge them in some flour, then fry them in olive oil. You can also stuff them and then fry them.
2. For small zucchini, simply split them in half, marinate them an hour or two in some olive oil & minced garlic, grill them lightly.
3. For the bigger ones, do them as my mother did. Slice them on a diagonal @ 1/8 inch thick. Dip them in beaten egg, then seasoned flour. Fry in some olive oil until crisp but not burned. Add some salt & pepper. Serve at room temperature.
Another reader left a comment on the blog (now published there), but again copied here for your convenience:
Wash them, cut in to 3/4" “slabs” the long way
Soak in roasted garlic olive oil 3 minutes, season with fresh herbs S&P
Grill on pre-heated grill, yes the oil will create fire and char the Zucc so be carful - yes; it will taste good!
It was this last suggestion (note similarity to #2 above) that turned into a guest and the great dinner in which that recipe was tried. Amazingly, our neighbors were “out”, so our's came from Shoppers yesterday, but they were fresh and nice looking. Besides the Zucc’s we had a wonderful salad of sliced local tomatoes, some creamy blue cheese (instead of the more mundane fresh “mozz”) and dressed with fresh basil and some of the roasted garlic olive oil. The protein was (yes, I’ll admit it) a very nice marinated pork tenderloin, grilled. Some visuals to whet your appetite:
I will also admit that the zucchini’s were very tasty, with a nice smoky finish from the grill, and more fresh herbs –thyme, parsley, salt and pepper. The char on the zucc’s was a nice touch.
After appetizers, wine with the dinner we lapsed into a very interesting discussion on the subject of “flavor”. It certainly gave me something to think about, and may alter my opinion of the vegetable in question. Instead of focusing on the ingredient (zucc’s, squash, legumes, etc.) itself, the true evaluation should be done on the finished preparation. That is, (probably somewhat clumsily stated) one should be permitted to take into account the skill of the chef and method of preparing the dish before any judgement of it. Consider the whole, not just the individual ingredients. Therefore, although biting a hunk of raw zucchini may not be very rewarding, if you wait until it has been sliced, marinated, grilled and dressed, you might find that product very acceptable, a good dish that just happens to contain (in this case) zucchini. The method of preparation can consider the main ingredient, like say, mushrooms have nice inherent flavor so maybe just a light dusting of flower and sautéed in butter is fine. For the “milder” zucchini, maybe a more aggressive idea would work. I hope this makes some sense. What a great way to spend the evening.
Oh yes, the wine to go with the pork and veggies was dug deep from the flutter cellars. Good company deserves good wine.
And, since we were in residence, we compromised our
DFD
2 comments:
Any tasting notes on the wine?
The wine was amazingly good. After trucking around maryland in not ideal conditions, it still had that Bordeaux "nose' and considerable fruit. too bad it was the last bottle
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