Things to do with zucchini

OK, this is a very un-Filipino post. It goes out to vegetable gardeners in western Washington State in the USA.

For some reason, western Washington is like zucchini heaven. Zucchinis thrive and grow absolutely huge there. Gardeners in the know, know to never plant zucchini as there's always someone in the neighborhood or your family who does so, and they'll have plenty of extra ones to give away. One time when I was young, someone knocked on our front door. When my mother opened it, there was nobody there but there was a large paper bag containing several zucchinis right in front of the door, like a foundling baby at an orphanage! We all laughed, saying "Oh-oh, looks like someone planted zucchini!"

It's weird: you look at your zucchini one day to see how they're doing, see that they're almost big enough, and think "They're just about ready to pick. I'll give them another day or two." Then when you go out to pick them you find that they've tripled in size! You have enough zucchini to eat it once or twice a week for a year, if it didn't spoil first (which it would unless used up or somehow preserved.)

So, say you either plant zucchini or someone gives you some. What the heck are you going to do with all that zucchini? Here are a few ideas.



Fried zucchini: peel and slice it, then either dip it in batter, or else in a beaten egg followed by dredging in seasoned flour or bread crumbs, then frying in hot oil: sort of like zucchini fritters or tempura.

Stewed zucchini with tomatoes: peel and cut the zucchini into large cubes. Cut several tomatoes into cubes as well, or else use a large can of stewed tomatoes. Stew them together, seasoning with salt, pepper and a little oregano. Drizzle with olive oil right before serving.

My mother used to make a lot of zucchini relish, recipes for which you can find online. It's kind of a sweet relish, meant for use on hamburgers and hot dogs. She'd prepare it then can it in small Mason jars. I don't know why she did this as we rarely ate hamburgers (they were a rare treat) and the only time i remember eating hot dogs as a child was when we were at Community Club picnics or at someone else's house. So we always had ten times more zucchini relish on the shelf than we had any earthly use for.

Zucchini bread: a sweet bread very similar to banana bread, only made with you know what instead of bananas.


A couple of my own ideas for using up zucchini:

Güveç, a Turkish vegetable casserole served lukewarm or at room temperature. It contains zucchini, eggplant, okra, green beans, tomatoes, garlic, onions, olive oil, sometimes cubes of lamb meat depending on the cook's own recipe, and some oregano. It's slowly stewed over low heat in a large, unglazed earthenware pot called a güveç (pronounced something like GOO-vech) then allowed to cool.

There's another Turkish recipe called imam baildi, which can be translated roughly as "the priest fainted." Story goes that while an imam was away on business, his wife Fatima made up this dish of stuffed eggplants cooked in olive oil. When he learned how much oil she'd used (it was a lot!), well, imam baildi! You could probably substitute zucchini for the eggplant. Cut it down the middle, scoop out some of the innards, and stuff with a mixture of ground beef or lamb, minced onions and garlic, olive oil and seasonings (salt, pepper and some oregano, probably: I didn't look up the recipe) then bake until done, adding some water to the baking pan first so the eggplants or zucchinis don't burn on the bottom.

There's a Korean (I think) dish made with either eggplant or zucchini, finely minced or ground then formed into small patties (probably along with an egg and some flour to bind it all together), red bell peppers and probably some chili oil as they're a bit spicier than the mild bell peppers would account for. These are fried until brown and crispy on the outside and are quite good.

I've heard that some people make pickles from pieces of zucchini, but I've never tried them. I've also heard of zucchini chutney but have no idea how it's made, or even what you're supposed to do with chutney: I had some mango chutney once at an Indian restaurant in Honolulu, along with the meal, and had no clue what I was supposed to do with it besides eat it. As you can see, I'm not very familiar with Indian food. (I do remember that my waitress was an Indian woman dressed in a flowered sari made of Hawaiian aloha shirt-like material, and wore a lei. Strange.)

I wonder if anyone's tried to make a zucchini liqueur? Fermented zucchini might be able to be distilled into a methanol fuel: it probably wouldn't be very efficient vs. using sweet corn but Washington zucchinis would at least be plentiful. (OK, now I'm reaching and getting a bit silly.)

Anyway, good luck using up all your zucchini, Washingtonians. Now, back to your regularly scheduled program of Filipino food recipes and reviews.