Zucchini Come True

Zucchini, cucumbers and basil- freshly picked from the garden.

Zucchini, some may hate it and some may love it. For those that love it, it's a dream come true when they are able to produce on their own more zucchini than they can eat! This year has been my best zucchini year so far... which isn't saying much since I've not been able to grow it successfully until now. Last year I got a couple fruits and one fruit was really a gourd (and inedible- as it had a hard shell and ultimately sat as a trophy on a kitchen shelf for most of the winter as it slowly turned orange) due to some strange cross pollination with some of my other plants in the garden.

What was so different about this year?

Transplants.

In the spring I started seeds indoors for plants for which I desired an increased success. Typically I have relied on direct sowing of seed in June. I've read in books that squash plants do not like to be transplanted so direct sowing seemed to be my only ideal choice for growing them. However, after learning that some gardeners with an abundance of zucchini every summer used transplants... I figured there must be no major harm in doing so myself. So in May I sowed my zucchini seeds indoors- in peat pots. Peat pots are supposed to help reduce shock to roots when transplanting because you can just place the whole pot in the ground and it will break down naturally. The seedlings grew very well indoors under my plant lights and it was very encouraging to place a significant sized plant out into the garden when the time came as opposed to a few seeds which may or may not survive at all. In addition, because peat pots never seem to break down as quickly as you want them to, I tore away at portions of the peat pots when transplanting time came to give the plants' roots an easier escape from their cramped confinement. All in all I planted out five zucchini plants... and I got five healthy productive plants too. It was not a seed gamble, I got exactly what I planted. And with five plants we have also receive the longed for zucchini harvest that has eluded us thus far.

Now of course weather and other factors could have played a part in this story of zucchini come true. It has been a rather warm and sunny summer (with an early spring). Squash plants like it warm. They also like delicious soil, which I provided for a bit better this year with my U-haul of compost that was worked into the entire garden. Its a good idea to give them a few shovel fulls of compost where you plant them, in the case of transplants dug a hole- filled it with compost and then gently inserted the young plants in their peat pots.

So how have we been eating some of this zucchini?

 Zucchini meets the vegetable peeler.

Pasta with Zucchini Sauce:

Saute 3 crushed garlic cloves in olive oil (about 6 tablespoons)

Thinly slice about 2 or 3 zucchini with a potato peeler and saute in oil with garlic.

Then stir in:

3 tablespoons chopped basil

2 chilies chopped

1oz lemon juice

5 tablespoons heavy cream

4 tablespoons (or more to taste) Parmesan cheese

Serve zucchini mixture on top of a plate of spaghetti, linguine or tagliatelle.

Note: This is one of my favorite ways to eat zucchini. The dish has a flavor that is a break from the usual and is so easy to make.

Fried Zucchini- it speaks for itself. Try breading the zucchini or a batter mixture and fry in a pan with enough oil that the slices do not rest on the bottom of the pan. The frying takes minutes to do. Here we used a beer batter taken from The Joy of Cooking.

Other ways we have used up our zucchini is by making vegetable lasagna, with layers of zucchini slices. Or grating zucchini into one cup quantities and freezing in individual bags for later use in zucchini bread (also one of my favorite ways to eat zucchini!).

How do you like to prepare your zucchini?