What to do with courgettes? Try fritters or fried flowers
We can thank the Italians, who started breeding the Central American gourd (Italian for zucca) in the 18th century, for the variety of courgettes in their gardens. Over time, the rest of Europe learned to grow them - and to incorporate them into all sorts of recipes, both savoury and sweet. What's your highlight?
Courgette flowers
Courgettes from Sluneční farma Vykáň arrive at Eska in Karlin. They are excellent raw, grilled with meat and fish and form part of various dishes. Even the flowers are not wasted - they are filled with courgette pesto and pickled lemons, for example.
For 4 servings you need:
- 12 flowers
- lemon verbena leaves for garnish
For the nut milk:
- 200 g hazelnuts
- ½ l of water
- salt to taste
For the verbena oil:
- 100 g fresh lemon verbena leaves
- 400 ml sunflower oil
For the kombu broth:
- 2 l vegetable broth
- 2 leaves of kombu seaweed (can be found in Asian grocery stores)
For the pesto:
- 200 g lemons pickled in salt (in Eska they pickle them for 4 to 5 weeks in salt with star anise and cloves)
- 240 ml cold-pressed sunflower oil
- 1/3 bunch of fresh basil
- 1 baby courgette
- 300 g pumpkin seeds
Process:
- Get started with nut milk. Soak the nuts overnight in water, then strain and blend with a pint of water. Strain through a cloth napkin and season with salt.
- Mix the milk with verbena oil: Heat the sunflower oil to 70 °C and blend with the verbena leaves for 2 minutes. Pour through a fine colander and let cool to room temperature.
- Heat the vegetable stock to 80 °C, add the seaweed and boil for 30 minutes. Chill the strained kombu broth.
- Prepare pesto for the flower filling: put the pickled lemons in a blender with the sunflower oil, basil and 400 ml of kombu stock (the rest can be used in risotto or soup). Blend for 5 minutes on full power.
- Chop courgettes into small cubes.
- Roast and coarsely blend the pumpkin seeds.
- Mix the pesto with the fresh zucchini and seeds. Fill the zucchini flowers with the mixture.
Serving: Place the stuffed zucchini blossoms on each plate, top with two tablespoons of warm nut milk and sprinkle with fresh verbena. Instead of nut milk, you can use vegetable demi glace or whey sauce and brown butter.
Courgette fritters
Years ago, Eska's patisserie invented a quick, fresh dessert - courgette fritters with sour cream, apples and watercress.
For the puree:
- 200 g raisins
- a little water
For the dough:
- 250 ml whole milk
- 2 eggs
- a pinch of salt
- 100 g raisin puree
- 170 g of plain flour
- 8 g baking powder
- pinch of ground cinnamon
- grated rind of one lemon
- 50 g melted butter + to pour over the fritters
- 100 g courgettes
- clarified butter for frying
+
- 300 g sour cream
- 100 g raisin puree
- apples (quantity is up to you)
- watercress
Process:
- First, get down to raisin puree: Boil the raisins in a little water (five minutes is enough!) and then blend them until smooth - small pieces don't matter!
- In a bowl, whisk the milk with the eggs, salt and half of the blended raisins.
- Gradually incorporate the flour with the baking powder, cinnamon and lemon zest.
- Finally, stir in the melted butter and the main thing: grated courgette.
- Leave the dough to rest in the fridge for half an hour to allow the ingredients to mix well.
- Fry the fritters in clarified butter ...and spread them with regular butter.
To plate: Serve the finished fritters with a dollop of sour cream sweetened with raisin puree and add apple cubes and watercress. Do not hesitate to garnish the result with additional herbs, edible sprouts and flowers - You can still get borage, marigold or mallow before October.
The fritters also go well with kefir or kefir cream, topped with brown butter or a little of apple balsamic. If you want to show off, bake apples in cider with butter, or you can make ice cream out of bread.
The plain flour can be replaced with gluten-free flour - try sorghum or buckwheat. Raisins can be substituted for prunes or cranberries, and you can also use the "pudding" to spread on pancakes!
With butternut squash and in ketchup
Most pros prefer young, unripe courgettes - they just lightly fry them and put them on the table as a side dish or main ingredient. Creative chefs have recently served them with lard and a butter sauce that's been seasoned with tomato water. At U Kalendů, they've added courgette to grilled Padron peppers with an aglio olio-style emulsion. And you know their courgette stuffing?
At La Degustation, they grill the courgettes until almost burnt and then marinate them in a solution of vinegar, water and salt, dill and mustard seed for about two weeks. Guests are served with chive mayonnaise, fresh herbs and a gel made from a brine brewed with agar.
A bland-tasting vegetable pairs well with the chili - the spicy salsa suits the courgettes as well as when lightly fried with spicy Andula salami. When it comes to pairing, you have the a choice of herbs such as marjoram, oregano, thyme or rosemary, basil, mint, coriander or dill and chives. French fries sautéed in butter Sprinkle with almond salt a bread crumbs, finish with citrus juice, and you're in for a treat!
Legumes and feta, fresh and aged cheeses like parmesan or pecorino, mozzarella and stracciatella, or creamy labneh. roasted pepper sauce also work with courgettes in various combinations. In Eska they also roast them with chicken, elsewhere they appear alongside pork, seafood and fish - anchovies and sardines included!
Courgettes go into salads raw or roasted (depending on its condition) and combined with with roasted aubergine and a dressing of yoghurt, mint and dill, or with a vinaigrette of poppy seed oil, wine vinegar, pickled ginger juice and salt. Mixed courgette and roasted pumpkin will welcome a shallot vinaigrette, which is fried until golden in oil and whisked with oil, vinegar and sweeter wine, salt and pepper.
Slightly older gourds can be sautéed in onion and boiled for ketchup. Season the sauce with sugar, vinegar, salt and herbs and make a chutney - you'll appreciate it with grilled cheese and meat or in sandwiches. Make sweet compote or pickles, too.
The list of tips must not be missing quick soup from peeled courgettes, which are cooked and blended with just a little liquid into a puree. This is softened with fresh cream (goat) cheese and finished with a few tablespoons of olive oil and salt. That's it!
For more ideas, head over to to Italian cuisine! A penchant for simplicity is reflected in spaghetti alla nerano with fried courgette and Provolone cheese or zucchine marinate con menta - slices of courgette à la carpaccio marinated in lemon juice with mint. Across Italy, they know zucchine trifolate (slices fried in oil with garlic and parsley), in Campania fried courgettes are marinated in vinegar with mint - ask for zucchine and scapece. And also courgette cake, scarpaccia, and its sweet version scarpaccia viareggina.
Source: Ambiente chefs, Let's Eat Italy, The Flavor Bible
