This week I had an out of garden experience. We're talkin' Meg Ryan, seriously so so so very good. It started out by reading Monkey and Squirrel Jen's raw zucchini pasta recipe and my interest was piqued. I wasn't think my good ol' boy of a husband would go for a raw meal, so I looked for a few more zucchini-as-pasta recipes and found the still-very-healthy NY Times Zucchini 'Pasta' recipe.
See, we have an overly generous neighbor that doesn't speak a lick of English, but loves to give us gifts from her garden. It's hard to say no to a sweet elderly woman, especially if you don't speak the same language. Enter 8 bat sized zucchini, part of an annual festival of zucchini around our house. I don't even grow it anymore and we always end up with a delicious and welcomed abundance. But what to do with the zucchini? Zucchini ice cream? Zucchini-tini? Zucchini fritters... they may not be healthy but they sure are tasty.
Back to the zucchini pasta? My new favorite way to use up all the fresh zucchini in the fridge. It's bland enough to satisfy the pasta craving and heating it up just a little bit made it even closer to its flour-counterpart, plus there's a satisfying crunch you just don't get with pasta. All I'm sayin' is you zucchini haters better recognize. {Ahem.}
So, if you're locking your doors and avoiding neighbors who share the bounty simply because of lack of recipes, here are a few ideas to get your mouth watering and get that friendly relationship back on track:
Baked Zucchini Fries from Heart of Light; Lasagna tart from 101 Cookbooks;Rosemary Cornmeal Crusted Zucchini with Grapefruit Aioli from food 52;Sicilian Style Zucchini Pizza from Real Simple; Vegetarian Pot Pie from Eating is Art.
Happy cookin' kiddos!
Renee
Garner has a passion to make things grow, although her brownish
thumb wants her to believe otherwise. When mud pies aren't on the menu,
you can find her doodling the days away at Wolfie and the
Sneak.
