Posts tagged as:

zucchini

Green Flecked Polenta With Roast Capsicum and Tomato

by Linda on February 7, 2012

Capsicums are the feature crop out of my garden this week, and they are so much in season that even if you aren’t growing them, you should be able to get beautiful local ones at Farmers Markets.  I steer clear of the standard California Wonder – the variety you find in supermarkets. It’s lower yielding, shorter lived, more vulnerable to fruit fly, and less heat and drought tolerant than I need. My favourite varieties at the moment are Corno de Toro, Hungarian Yellow wax, and one I call Supermarket Flats because the seed came from some capsicums I bought in the supermarket, just because they were unusual and I hoped they might be non-hybrid. I think they are actually Baby Reds, and they are doing brilliantly for me.

So roast capsicums are the star in the  Tuesday Night Vego Challenge this week. Polenta goes really well with them, and of course, this time of year, I put zucchini in everything.

The Recipe

Makes two dinner serves, but can easily be doubled.

The Polenta

Lightly sauté

  • one finely diced spring onion (greens and whites)
  •  with 2 cloves of garlic finely diced.

Add

  • ½ cup of grated zucchini
  • ¼ cup finely chopped basil
  • ½ cup fine polenta
  • 2 cups water 

Cook, stirring, for about 10 minutes till it goes very thick, like thick porridge. Then add 70 gm low fat feta, grated, and continue cooking, stirring, for just a minute or two to melt the feta through. (You can leave out the feta if you are avoiding dairy, and it will still work, but it does make it lovely and creamy). Taste and add salt to taste.  (It doesn’t need much – the feta is salty).

Turn the mixture out into an oiled small pie plate or tray. You want it to be  about 2 cm deep.  Use the back of a wet spoon to smooth the top. Put the pie plate in the coldest part of your fridge, or in the freezer, for about 10 minutes to set.

Roast Capsicum and Tomato

To do this in half an hour, you need to multitask and put the capsicum on to char while the polenta is cooking. You can skip this stage, but it is really worth doing.

  • Char the skin of some capsicums over a gas flame, or under a grill, or over a barbeque. I like a mixture of red and yellow, and how many depends on how big they are. Use tongs to turn until the skin is blackened and blistering all over. Quickly put the hot capsicums in a plastic bag or tupperware container or a small pot with a lid – something that will hold in the steam. Leave them to steam and cool until you can handle them. You should then be able to easily rub off the skin. Don’t worry if there are little bits of charred skin left – it adds to the flavour. Slice the capsicum open, discard the seeds, and slice the flesh into strips.
  • In a frypan, saute in olive oil one large or two small red onions, sliced,  and two or three cloves of finely chopped garlic. Add the capsicum and just a teaspoon of balsamic vinegar.
  • Add  a good handful of halved cherry tomatoes and heat them through. You don’t want the cherry tomatoes to cook down, just heat up.

Frying the Polenta and Assembling

The polenta should be set. Turn it out onto a board and slice into slabs.  Heat a heavy frypan with a little olive oil up to very hot. Don’t put the polenta in until it is hot, or it will stick.

Fry the polenta till it is golden, turning once. Try not to keep turning it – you will get a better crust by turning just once.
Serve with the roast capsicum on top.

Are you doing the Tuesday Night Vego Challenge, or cooking easy, healthy, in season, weeknight vego recipes regularly? Links are welcome in the Comments.

You Might Also Like:

{ 3 comments }

Zucchini Macaroni Cheese With Crumbles

by Linda on January 24, 2012

Have you noticed yet that I have a certain amount of experience with zucchini recipes? There is a Marge Piercy poem that I think perfectly sums up zucchini: Attack of the Squash People. I thought I had learned the lesson: One, no more than two, zucchini each planting break.

But then this year I discovered trombochino.  I like climbers in my fortress fenced up-gardens  - they maximise the use of space - and I really like trombochino. They taste pretty much like zucchini – a bit firmer and denser, like zucchini minus the middle bit.   But I don’t know whether it is just this year – it has been a perfect curcurbit year, cooler and wetter than usual but with the long, light days of summer – but the trombochino are triffid-like taking over the garden. I leave bags of them in the roadside mailbox. The chooks refuse to eat any more.

This is the third in the Tuesday Night Vego Challenge series. It’s an old favourite. It uses about 4 medium zucchini.  Eight if you double the recipe – it also makes good leftovers for lunch. Makes a small dint.

The Recipe:

Makes four large serves.

This can be done in half an hour but you have to really multitask at the beginning because most of the half hour is baking time.

  • Oven on to heat up.  You need a fairly hot oven.
  • Kettle on to boil for water for pasta.
  • Food processor out.  You can do it all without a food processor, just with a grater and a blender or eggbeater, but I can’t promise half an hour.

Part 1: Pasta

Cook a cup of pasta in boiling water till just cooked. Don’t overcook it.

  • Macaroni, shells, or small spirals work best.

Part 2: The Crumble

Crumb

  • two slices of heavy wholegrain bread and mix with
  • two dessertspoons of olive oil and
  • a dessertspoon of grated parmesan.

I do this in my food processor. Leave the crumbs a bit coarse, not too fine.

Part 3: White Cheese Sauce

In a small pot, heat

  • a cup of low fat milk with
  • a cup of low fat cottage cheese and
  • 3 bay leaves,

till the milk starts to rise. It will curdle – that’s ok. Fish the bay leaves out.

While the milk is heating, tip the crumbles out of the food processor and (you don’t need to wash it), blend

  • 1 egg and
  • 2 big dessertspoons of plain wholemeal flour.

With the blender going, add the hot milk-cottage cheese mix. Pour back into the small pot and reheat, stirring with a wooden spoon, till it thickens. This will take just a minute or two.

Part 4 – Grated Zucchini and Feta

Grate

  • two packed cups of zucchini (or trombochino) and
  • 100 grams of low fat feta cheese.

Slice enough tomatoes to cover the top.

Assembling:

Mix the grated feta and zucchini into the white cheese sauce and tip the lot into a small baking tray.  I have a square, pyrex 21 cm dish that is perfect for bakes like this.

Cover the top with sliced tomatoes, then spread the crumble mix on top of them.

Bake in a medium hot oven for around 20 minutes till the top is golden and crunchy and the middle is hot all the way through.

Great on its own, or with a green salad, and makes good left-overs for lunch the next day as well.

Did your Tuesday Night Vego recipe feature zucchini too?  Feel free to leave links in the comments.

You Might Also Like:

{ 14 comments }

Gnocchi With Zucchini and Pesto

by Linda on January 10, 2012

gnocchi with zucchini and pesto

 

I’ve just realised a problem with the Tuesday Night Vego Challenge. Do I post it on Wednesday? After making it on Tuesday? Or do I post it on Monday? For readers to make on Tuesday?  I’ve decided to forgo logic entirely, and just post on Tuesday. I actually usually make things several times to get the recipe written down pat before I post them anyway.

I have zucchini and their close cousin trombochino going nuts in my garden this time of year. It is compulsory in our household to have zucchini every day, I’ve given so many away that my friends are avoiding me, the chooks have gone on strike and refuse to eat any more.  This is the first year I’ve grown trombochino (Diggers seeds) and I think they have upstaged Blackjack as my favourite variety. They suit my garden well because they grow into a climbing, rambling vine, like a very rampant cucumber. I can grow them up the fences of my fortress fenced beds and they provide a bit of shade for everything in the bed and maximise the use of fenced space – conventional zucchini take up a lot of ground room. But next year, I’ll plant just two or three vines all up for the whole summer!

I also have basil going nuts in my garden this time of year. It is one of the few leafy greens that will cope with summer. So I make pesto just about every week and we have it on sandwiches, in salad dressings, on vegetables. This recipe also uses lots of my lovely new season garlic, and the last of the early spring planted potatoes. We don’t eat a huge amount of potatoes – I’m not active enough to afford the carbohydrates. But the recipe is healthier than it might at first appear, with only one medium or two small potatoes for two generous serves.

The Recipe:

Makes two good serves.

With a bit of multitasking I can make this well within the half hour.  Please feel free to join in the Challenge -  fast, easy, healthy, in season, real food -  and add your link or recipe in the Comments .

Pesto:

You need a couple of tablespoons of pesto for this. I make it regularly this time of year and usually have some in the fridge. It’s just

  • 40 grams of nuts (macadamias, cashews, almonds or pine nuts), lightly toasted
  • 40 grams of parmesan
  • a cup, packed of basil
  • a clove of garlic
  • salt to taste
  • enough good olive oil to blend

If you haven’t got it made and you are making it, get it all ready then use the food processor to do it straight after the spuds. That way you don’t have to wash anything up, and it still gets ten minutes or so to mellow.

Gnocchi:

  • Scrub 250 grams of potatoes, chop and cook them, skin on, till they are tender.  Waxy potatoes like Dutch Cream, Kipfler,  Bintje, Nicola,  or Pink Eye are best. I used the  kipflers that I grew this year for these.
  • While the potatoes are cooking, heat your largest, heavy bottomed fry pan with a little olive oil. Fry about two cups of sliced baby zucchini with two or three cloves of chopped garlic till they just start to colour.
  • Drain the potatoes and put the pot back on with lots of water for boiling the gnocchi.
  • Process the potatoes with a food processor, or through a mouli or ricer, to get a smooth puree.
  • Blend with an egg, a good pinch of salt, and enough OO bakers flour (I use the bakers flour that I use for my sourdough) to make a smooth, kneadable dough. My faithful Braun food processor copes with the spuds, one egg, and about half a cup of flour to make a thick batter.  I tip another half a cup of flour on my benchtop, tip the potato mix on top of it, and knead it in.  Knead very briefly to make a smooth soft not-sticky dough.
  • Roll the dough into long snakes, about 2 cm diameter and cut the snakes into 2 cm slices. Use a fork to squash each gnocchi slightly, like the picture at the bottom.
  •  Cook the gnocchi in two batches in boiling water until they rise to the top. This will take less than a minute. Use a slotted spoon to take them out into a colander.
  •  Is the pan with the zucchini, garlic and olive oil still hot? Get it hot again and add the gnocchi. Cook, tossing gently,  for just a couple of minutes till the gnocchi get a little bit of colour.  I like to add a few handfuls of quartered cherry tomatoes at the end and just heat them through, then add two or three good spoonfuls of pesto.  Toss the pesto through and serve.

You Might Also Like:

{ 9 comments }

Stuffed Zucchini Flowers

December 6, 2011

For years I have wondered whether zucchini flowers were the new mushroom, as in the famous 70s feminist adage ‘Life is too short to stuff a mushroom’.  Now I know. The flowers themselves have very little taste; in fact there’s very little of anything to them. But there’s a textural phenomenon – a little bite of [...]

Read the full article →

Zucchini Ginger Muffins

March 2, 2011

I promised there would be more Muesli Bar Challenge recipes this year but there’s been too much else to write about.  But a golden zucchini that got away inspired me.  What do you do with a kilo of zucchini? This recipe is in my handwritten book as Wwoofer’s Zuke Bread because the original came to me [...]

Read the full article →

Albanian Style Snapper, Squid, and Spring Vegetable Soup

November 18, 2010

We stopped in at a fish shop on the way home from visiting our daughter at the coast yesterday.  I had just bought a half kilo of squid, thinking calamari, when I noticed they had snapper frames at a ridiculously low price. Snapper are listed as a sustainable catch, and I like the idea that, [...]

Read the full article →

Greens as Themselves

September 9, 2010

Cooking vegetables in my mother’s generation meant boiling them until they gave up.  I am an eldest child, my partner is a youngest, so his mother was a generation older.  Her version of chokos was boiled until they liquified. No wonder  as kids we weren’t great fans of vegetables! It is amazing how much food [...]

Read the full article →

Green Green Polenta

August 11, 2010

This is a riff on Mollie Katzen’s Green Green Noodle Soup, with a little bit of “Green Eggs and Ham” inspiration.  Polenta is ground corn and not hard to make if you grow corn in summer. In fact, it is probably the grain staple most suited to  my climate. It’s medium GI and a good [...]

Read the full article →

Casey’s Muffinishly Delicious Muffins (Pumpkin, Feta and Pine Nuts)

July 16, 2010

One has to love a bloke who can bake, especially when he’s your son! Hola mama, I’m pretty sure everything is about right on this recipe. I made it by feel but I tried to measure stuff, wasn’t entirely successful with the measuring but the muffins are good. Makes about 12 1 ¾ cups wholemeal SR [...]

Read the full article →

← Previous Entries