Is That a Zucchini in Your Pocket or are You Just Happy to see Me?

Zucchinis are funny, I can look at them growing and think they are still a little too small, I go back a couple of days later and they are the size of baseball bats. Not only that, but because the leaves are so big and the stalks are so thick, I can easily miss the zucchini altogether until I trip over the darn thing. Just in case you're wondering, I put the 1 kg jar of peanut butter in the picture for scale.

The first year I was here, I saw some zucchini plants so I bought them, not knowing a thing about them. I had actually eaten it once in my life, at a restaurant. I really only bought them for something to stick in the garden. I figured they'd be like cucumber plants, just a little bit bigger, HA! I was amazed at how big they got! Their broad, dark green leaves were easily two feet across and I constantly mistook the stalks for zucchinis because they were so thick. Some of the plants were waist high. On top of that, I also discovered that six plants could feed a family of ten, I had 12 plants for a family of four, even I can do the math here. The next year, all my zuc plants died before even producing one little old zucchini. Talk about going from feast to famine. Since then, I've had a little success with them but nothing matching that first harvest ... until this year. I have 4 plants all producing nicely. I do try to harvest them before they get too big, but as you can see, I'm failing miserably.

So what does one do with zucchini anyhow? That first year's bounty forced me to become incredibly inventive with recipes. I have discovered how amazingly versatile this humble little veggie is.


One of the favorite ways we enjoy them is in a recipe I adapted and now call Zucchini Pie. It's very tasty, it has a base of cheese, eggs, cream and sour cream; there's tomato, garlic, onions, fresh basil, bread crumbs, Parmesan, and a bunch of other tasty things in it. It's great hot from the oven and cold on lunches. So, of course since it's so wonderful, it takes forever to make. The zucchini needs to sit in salt then rinse & dried, then brushed with oil and broiled. There's chopping, mincing and grating galore, not to mention making the yeast crust. Try as I might, I cannot make a zucchini pie in under four hours. So when I do make it, I double or triple the recipe, thus cutting down the time per pie considerably, takes me five hours to make 3, instead of 4 hours to make one. They freeze beautifully and I haven't taken one to a potluck where it wasn't a hit. It's also great to have them handy in the freezer for a quick meal or a side dish.


I found a recipe for zucchini bread. Again I adapted it a bit to our tastes. You can't even taste the zucchini in this. It's a tasty loaf with lemon and Cinnamon. It converts to muffin size with no problem. It's easy to toss a muffin at the kids when they insist they don't have time for breakfast, and since they are eating a muffin anyhow, they might as well have some juice. And hey, how 'bout cereal or an egg with that muffin? The muffins also go into lunch bags frequently. They freeze well, too. The bread is great with tea or coffee (and just a leeetle whipped cream). Easily warmed in the oven from frozen state, they're a life-saver when friends pop in for a cuppa.

Shredded zucchini freezes beautifully, no blanching, no mucking around. So far, no matter how big they get, I don't need to seed them or remove the membrane. I grate it in the food processor, divvy it up into freezer bags in two cup portions and I'm done. When I want to make a zucchini bread, it's ready. It' also great in olive oil with onions, garlic and a little bit of fresh ginger, takes all of 2 - 3 minutes to fry up. I throw it into chili or spaghetti sauce or use it in a stir-fry. I can puree it and use it in baking, substituting some of the liquid in the recipe. It adds nutritional value without adding the calories. It's mellow flavor works with any other flavoring and doesn't overtake the recipe.

And finally, they keep really well in my cold room. At least they do when they are the size of Louisville sluggers. By the time we ran out of zucchini that first year, it was January and I had only lost one or two to spoilage. So when I'm up to my eyeballs in teens, car pooling, harvesting, chickens, rabbits and their counterparts - dust bunnies, and whatever else gets thrown my way, I just pop them in the cold room. Sliced thick and dipped in batter, they fry up golden as the sun and still taste of the summer morn they were picked.