Happy National Zucchini Day!

In honor of this national celebration of the giant green squash, I decided to share with you some ways we've been enjoying the bounty of our garden. Even if you don't have a garden, zucchini are really cheap this time of year, so I hope you can use one of the following recipes to take advantage of the savings!

The pasta pictured above is Farfalle with Zucchini and Gorgonzola from Serious Eats. We halved the cheese because we like a milder blue cheese flavor, but besides that we stuck to the recipe. This was Kyle's favorite way we've prepped zucchini so far (besides cake). 

Above is a Zucchini Potato Frittata from the kitchn. We omitted to bacon to make it slightly healthier, and it was still very good! We made it twice in two weeks, which for our ever-changing menu is a big deal. This and the next preparation have been my favorite so far. 

This is adapted from a grilled zucchini salad from the kitchn. We don't have a grill, so we used a different technique for the zucchini. We made it twice. Once, pairing the zucchini with uncooked cherry tomatoes as in the original recipe, and the second with cooked full size tomatoes. The amounts are very flexible, but here's a basic outline of the recipe:

Zucchini and Tomato Salad

2 medium zucchini

1 to 2 cups cherry tomatoes, halved or 3 to 4 regular tomatoes, diced

1 ounce Parmesan cheese, shredded or shaved

2 tablespoons basil, chopped or chiffonaded

1-2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

1-2 tablespoons olive oil

Heat up a cast iron pan. Cut the zucchini into quarters. Add olive oil to the cast iron pan and cook the zucchini on all sides until charred, about 1-2 minutes per side. Remove the zucchini and dice. If using good tomatoes, combine everything together and you're done. If you're tomatoes aren't amazing and they need a little help to be more flavorful, char them as well in the cast iron pan for a few minutes. Either way, this is a really easy summer side dish to throw together! Add some beans and grain and you've got a whole meal.

Farmers Market Stir-Fry

What do you do if you come home with more produce than you planned from the farmers market? Well we decided to stir fry it! For this round we used peas, carrots, broccoli and green onions, but I think it could be good with lots of different vegetables! This is my favorite kind of meal- simple and delicious. I'd highly recommend checking out the vegetable stir fry tutorial at the kitchn that I adopted this recipe from. They have some great tips for making an exceptional stir fry!

Farmers Market Stir Fry
Serves 3 to 4, depending on how many vegetables you use
Adapted from the kitchn

1 1/2 to 2 pounds assorted vegetables
1 1/2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger
1 minced jalapeño (optional)
8 scezchuan peppercorns
2 tablespoons vegetable or chicken broth
2 teaspoons soy sauce
1 1/2 teaspoons rice vinegar
3 medium cloves garlic, smashed
2-3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
Toasted sesame seeds to top (optional)
4 cups cooked rice

1. Chop the vegetables into uniform pieces, and put them in a bowl so that you can be ready to dump them in quickly. Leave the ginger and jalapeno separate.

2. Combine the broth, soy sauce and rice vinegar in a small bowl to make the sauce.

3. Heat your wok or cast iron skillet on medium with 2 tablespoons oil and the sczechuan peppercorns for about five minutes to let them infuse the oil. You can use more or less depending on your heat tolerance. I like to smash the peppercorns so that more of the flavor gets in the oil. After the oil is infused, take them out, unless you particularly like big bursts of heat in your food.

4. Turn up the heat on the burner to high and let it heat for another minute or two. When the oil starts smoking, add the ginger and jalapeno and stir vigorously, so they don't burn, for about 30 seconds until fragrant.

5. Add the rest of the chopped vegetables. Add more oil if necessary. Salt them and stir fry for a few minutes until the vegetables begin to brown (hard vegetables) or wilt (soft, leafy vegetables).

6. Add the sauce and stir fry for a couple more minutes until the vegetables are crisp tender.

7. Serve over rice and top with toasted sesame seeds. I think cashews or peanuts might be good as well. If you try them let me know!

Cauliflower Steaks with Tomato Sauce and Olive Relish

This was a fun experimental meal. I'd never heard of roasting whole slices of cauliflower before, but the technique was a hit! I didn't love the relish, so I'd skip that next time since it took the most work. I found out later that our sundried tomatoes weren't that good, so maybe that was the problem. If you want to give it a go, the relish might be better for you with good tomatoes. I'd probably use this cooking technique and the tomato sauce again since we really enjoyed those components. We made this as a main, but I think it would be a better side. You can find the recipe on Bon Appetit. 

Super Easy Slow Cooker Beef and Veggie Stew

Just so you know, this recipe works much better if you remember to put the beef in the slow cooker. But, I can attest now that it works either way. 

I guess this is more a technique than a recipe. I chop up whatever hearty vegetables I have around (here carrots and potatoes) throw them in the slow cooker with a couple cans of diced tomatoes, lots of spices, some beef and cook! This is great for when you won't have much time to cook in the evening, but you still want something new.

The reason I forgot the beef this time is that I prepped everything the night before because I knew I wanted to sleep in. I cut the beef, but kept it separate from the veggies in the fridge overnight for food safety reasons. I slept in more than I expected the next morning and in my rush I only remembered the chopped veggies and cans of diced tomatoes in the morning. Halfway to school I remembered the beef, but I couldn't turn back or I'd be late.

Luckily, the beef was defrosted that night and we sauteed it in the skillet and tossed it in. It wasn't quite as tender as it would have been otherwise, but it still tasted good! Also, this makes great leftovers which are perfect to stick in the freezer for later days when you don't want to make dinner.

Here's an approximate recipe:

Easy Slow Cooker Beef Stew

Serves 6 (or 2 for 3 days!)

1 pound cut stewing beef

2-3 pounds cut hearty vegetables (ie potatoes, carrots, onions, some mushrooms, leeks, etc.)

2 cans diced tomatoes

2ish cups water or beef broth (enough to almost cover everything)

Spices (ex: salt, pepper, bay leaf, paprika, garlic powder, dehydrated onions, fennel seed, oregano)

The night before: cut the hearty vegetables and combine them with the spices. Refrigerate. If your slow cooker has a removable insert you can put them in there. Cut the beef and refrigerate in a separate container. Maybe put it on top of the vegetables so you don't forget it. 

The morning of: put everything you prepped into the slow cooker along with the diced tomatoes and water. Set on low for 8ish hours. Luckily this is pretty flexible and forgiving depending on your schedule. Come back and enjoy! Or come back and realize you forgot the beef. Then cook that real quick and enjoy!

Lentil Salad with Walnuts and Yellow Beans

This was my first try at cooking lentils, and guess what? I really like them! The inspiration for this recipe was a colorful lentil salad with walnuts and herbs from the kitchn. I adjusted ingredients and amounts to what we had on hand, so feel free to do the same! I would definitely make this again, but I think I'd use bell peppers or carrots instead of yellow beans because I think they'd match the other flavors better. The yellow beans were still pretty good though. Another plus for this recipe is that it can easily be made vegetarian or vegan.

Lentil Salad with Walnuts and Yellow Beans
Serves 8

1 1/4 pounds lentils
5 cups chicken broth, vegetable broth or water
1 red onion
4 cloves garlic
1 pound green or yellow beans
1 cup chopped toasted walnuts
1/2 cup celery leaves
1/2 cup carrot greens
1/4 cup basil
1/4 cup flat leaf parsley
1 1/2 ounces Parmesan cheese (optional, but delicious!)
2 tablespoons molasses
2 tablespoons pomegranate red wine vinegar

Sort and rinse the lentils. Place them in a large stockpot with the chicken broth or water. Bring to a boil and then simmer for 20-30 minutes. Check to see if they're done by eating some lentils. They should be tender but not mushy. Our ended up a little mushy, but still tasted good. If you want the salad to be cool you can spread the lentils out on a baking sheet. If you're fine with warm lentils, you can just take them off the heat.

Dice the onion and the beans. Mince the garlic. Chop up the greens and herbs. Heat some olive oil in a skillet and saute the onions and beans for 4-6 minutes. Then add the garlic, greens and herbs. Saute until fragrant, about one minute more. Stir in the molasses and vinegar and cook for about another minute.

Combine the vegetables and lentils. Sprinkle Parmesan on top and enjoy!

Recipe Redo: Summer Squash and Tomato Gratin

We revisited this recipe recently, but doubled it. Unfortunately it was a little soggy. I looked back at the inspirational recipes and realized that the one which included milk also had potatoes. I think we must not have added the full amount of milk on the first one because it was crisp. Either way, I'd recommend leaving out the milk for this one. Here's the revised recipe:

Summer Squash and Tomato Gratin

serves 4

Prep: 15 min

Cook: 35 min

2-3 squash/ zucchini
6 oz mozarella (we used part-skim, but whatever you have works)
1-2 tomatoes
1/4 cup breadcrumbs (crushed croutons could substitute)
1 tablespoon dried basil
2 teaspoons dried thyme
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons + olive oil


Wash and slice the squash and zucchini into thin coins.
Spread some olive oil in a 9" square pan
Toss the sliced squash and zucchini with 2 tablespoons of olive oil.
Layer a third of the squash and zucchini on the bottom and sprinkle salt and pepper over them.
Spread about 2 ounces mozarella on top.
Repeat the squash (+salt and pepper) and mozarella layers and top it off with a final squash layer with more salt and pepper.
Sprinkle on about a tablespoon dried basil.
Slice the tomatoes and layer them on top.
Sprinkle it with about 2 teaspoons dried thyme and some more cheese.
Bake it in the oven at 400 for 30 minutes uncovered, or until the tomatoes start browning and crisping on the edges.
Sprinkle breadcrumbs on top and let it bake for 5 more minutes.
Enjoy before Fall comes!

Chinese Five Spice Stir Fry

I love trying new flavors, so I ordered some interesting new spices I'd heard about but never tried thanks to a Penzeys gift card from some awesome relatives! One of those was a Chinese Five Spice powder. There was a recipe for sauce on the bottle that we decided to try the other day in a stir fry. Penzeys mix is Chinese cassia cinnamon, star anise, anise seed, ginger, and cloves, so if you don't have the five spice blend you can make your own.

I love making stir fry. It's such an easy way to combine whatever meat and veggies you have on hand. In this one we used some pork, orange bell peppers, broccoli, and chard stems (don't throw out the stalks! they're great!). In case you don't already know this technique, here is an easy way to julienne a bell pepper:

Cut off the top and bottom (which also happens to make really cool looking flower-like pieces).

Make one vertical cut and open the pepper. Take out the seeds. You can also scrape off the ribs if you care about looks, but I didn't so I left them on. Then cut into strips (please ignore my non-uniformity). Done!

We cut up and browned some pork and then added our veggies and sauce. 

After cooking until meat and veggies were done, we served it over brown rice. 

 The sauce recipe called for 2 TB orange juice, 3 TB soy sauce, 1/4 tsp pepper, 1 tsp honey, 2 tsp five spice blend, and hot peppers to taste. We didn't have the hot peppers, so we omitted them.

The stir fry was a fun new flavor. There was definitely a spicy element missing though, so next time I'll be sure to add the hot peppers called for in the sauce. It was still pretty good without it.

P.S. Remember how I said this blog would be mostly desserts, well I guess I was wrong. Sorry!