Raw Zucchini Pasta with Lemony Garlic Vinagrette

Ever since I read the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver, I have tried very hard to only buy fruits and vegetables that are in season. This ensures that we are eating foods that taste the best and that haven't been shipped half-way around to world, wasting valuable resources. Every once in a while I will cave in, though, when I experience a moment of weakness at the imported organic tomato section. Yes, the tomatoes cost $6 per pound, but memories of how delicious my garden-grown heirloom tomatoes taste overpower my environmental guilt and I go for it. But no matter how perfectly ripe it looks and feels, and no matter how much dang money I spend on it, that mid-winter tomato never tastes good. I have done this enough times to be sure of it: tomatoes are not meant to be eaten in February.

But what about zucchini, I wondered? Yesterday there was an unexpected pile of organic zucchini squash in the produce section and as soon as I saw it I could almost taste what I was going to make with it: pasta! Now, I almost never purchase zucchini because I grow so much of it in the summer that the absence of it during the winter is a bit of a relief. But yesterday I just had to have it, grown in Peru or not. Throwing conscientious eating out the window, I snapped up a bag full, grabbed a bunch of fresh basil and hot-tailed it home to see if I could make what I was tasting in my imagination a reality.

To my surprise and delight, I did! First try, too, which is a rarity for me in pretty much anything I do. Sitting down to enjoy my bowl of freshly made pasta was so luxurious - especially for someone who hasn't been able to eat ANYTHING resembling noodles for almost two years (nope, not even the gluten-free ones, dang). My husband was pretty excited too - pasta without the after-pasta bloat? Make a double batch next time!

RAW ZUCCHINI PASTA WITH LEMONY GARLIC VINAIGRETTE

Ingredients

5 small straight green zucchini
1 small sweet red onion, thinly sliced
1/4 cup nicoise style olives, pitted and chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
4 T olive oil
juice of 1 lemon
2 T fresh basil chopped, or 3 T dry basil
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper


1.) In a medium sized bowl, combine the olive oil and lemon juice and whisk until well combined. Stir in the minced garlic and set aside.

2.) Using a spiralizer or vegetable peeler, make "noodles" out of your zucchini. (I have a spiralizer but used my peeler this time - just peel and peel until your zucchini are turned into a big beautiful pile of skinny fettucini-like ribbons.) Add these zucchini noodles to your lemon juice vinaigrette along with the onions, olives, and basil.

3.) sprinkle on your salt and pepper and mix well until all the vegetables are well coated. Cover and let sit in the fridge for at least a few hours to allow the flavors to marry.

4.) You could add more salt and pepper before serving depending on your flavor preferences. This would also taste great with the addition of some feta cheese, if you are lucky enough to be able to eat things like that! This recipe serves two people - the perfect guilt-free Valentine's Day treat so that you can indulge in dessert. :)

Another zucchini recipe

Around here we are enjoying a second round of zucchini madness. It isn't anything like the desperate leaving-zucchini-on-your-neighbor's-doorstep-in-the-middle-of-the-night madness of mid summer, but after a good shot of fish emulsion, the zucchini plants have perked up for a bit more production. Of course, zucchini bread is in order, but I found this amazing recipe for Squashamole on Rachel Ray's website. I've already made this twice, the first time requiring me to "fire up the grill" for the first time ever in all my 31 years. (My husband got a pretty good laugh when I told him I tried lighting the charcoal briquettes without using lighter fluid. Imagine the stupidity. He said the fact that I did this should be a blog post in itself, but I assured him that the only people who would find the incident as funny as he did are off reading hunting and motorcycle blogs rather than this one. Anywho, I digress.) What I'm trying to say is this: if you have some zucchini, you must try this recipe. It is delicious. The end.

Zucchini Madness

It's an old story, really. Late summer and a sudden insurmountable influx of zucchini. No matter how many you eat and give away there are still more. You start carrying huge zucchini around in your purse and car on the off chance you can find someone to foist them on. This is how I find myself. After all my complaints about poorly producing zucchini plants (mine are still turning out a pathetic one zucchini per week) my dad went out of town, leaving me in charge of his garden for a week. That's his garden, in the first picture. Only one of those huge garden beds has zucchini growing in it, but there is absolutely no hope for me. I just can't keep up with them. The first day he was gone I harvested 4 the size of my arm. I lugged them into his house to put them in the fridge and found TEN similarly sized ones already in there! Plus four really big yellow summer squash.

So I've been looking for zucchini recipes. On the off chance you find yourself in the same predicament as me, and are out of people to give your zucchini to, here are a few places to check out. This post from Kalyn's Kitchen has TONS of great zucchini ideas, as well as links to lots more yummy looking recipes. I didn't even have time to check them all out, but I'm pretty excited about these yummy stuffed zucchini bites.

And this zucchini pasta salad by my friend Kristy (of the famous Keepin' it Kind blog - seriously, have you not checked it out yet???) looks absolutely amazing. I'm planning this for tomorrow night. Or morning. Or in an hour or so...

And finally, a zucchini bread that I can eat, which means it is gluten free and candida-friendly. Actually, it is grain-free and calls for a bit of chocolate and natural sweetener, both of which I leave out. Even without those things it tastes delicious, so if you are on a less strict diet than me I'm sure you will find it divine. I have three loaves of this waiting for me in the freezer as we speak.

Man, all this talk about recycling zucchini into food is giving me the itch to cook. Please please share your zucchini recipes with me - I need anything I can get!