Courgette, I need 101 things to do with it..

[zanz1bar]

Glut time,

What can you suggest?
I have made cheese scones and chocolate cake, battered, grated, diced, fried, roasted and my favorite 'guess the secret ingredient'.

Google courgette, Parmesan and basil soup - can't remember who does the recipe, but you'll find it. We've also had more courgettes than I know what to do with (and more to come!). But this soup makes them all worthwhile. It's magnificent.
Also google Nigel Slater's courgette cake. That's lovely, too.
Oh, and I'm planning to put some in a quiche with some smoked salmon this weekend (bought 2 packs on offer).
Hope this helps!

I made a lovely courgette cake (no chocolate) the other day.

Courgette batons fried with cumin andgarlic and onion. When brown add squeeze of lemon and crumble fetta over top. Good with pasta or alone.

C. cake very good, yes.

Have just made Greek courgette pie with filo pastry, eggs, cream, feta, mint, dill, spring onion etc.

Oh its goooooood. Its also good cold. DH will be eating it for lunch all week as the DC aren't keen sadly.

Its also good with creme fraiche or cream and dill in a pasta sauce or with feta, dill and onion in a fritter.

Parboil for 5 minutes, slice in two long ways and remove the flesh with a knife and/or teaspoon. Chop this and squeeze the excess moisture out. Then mix it with some breadcrumbs, ricotta (or whizzed up cottage cheese) and garlic. Mix in an egg yolk & season, then bung the filling back in the skins. Sprinkle with cheese and bung them in the oven for about half an hour. V yummy!

courgette and coriander with tomato and onions. freezes well too. can be stew or whizzed and thinned a bit to make a v nice soup.

courgette carbonara!

Wow, thanks everyone some fantastic ideas.
I will try the soup and pie, very interested in the carbonara.

risotto is also good with leeks, peas and parmesan.

Courgette crumble - soften courgettes in olive oil. Put in casserole dish with tinned tomatoes and a couple of cloves of crushed garlic. Top with bread crumbs and grated cheese. Bake in oven. Is nice with a roast but also on its own and is also nice cold the following day.

I've just made the simplest, most delicious courgette soup.

Fry an onion in 1oz butter
Chop 1lb of courgettes and add to the onions
Stir
Add 1 and a half pints of veg stock
Bring to the boil
Simmer for 30 minutes
Take off the heat
Blend until smooth

It's absolutely gorgeous - really creamy and smooth. It tastes like it's got milk or cream in it, but there really isn't anything except the above ingredients.

in the past few weeks we have had

courgette ristotto
2 different courgette pasta sauces
courgettes boiled
corgettes fried in a little butter
courgette soup
corgette gratin
chocolate courgette cake (YUM)

i will be making:
courgette bread
courgette muffins
and more chocolte courgette cake...
and more risotto
and probably more coiurgette pasta sauce
and more boiled / fried..

cougette pie.

Sweat chopped courgettes with sping onion, maybe a bit of leek too. Drain any excess liquid off. Mix with pkt feta, beaten egg, dill, cumin, salt and pepper, bit of parmesan.

Layer 3 sheets filo in pie tin, add filling mixture. Add 4-5 buttered filo sheets on top. Cook for half an hour or so.

Even more lovely when completely cool.

thinly slice length ways, grill or griddle. Toss in lemony minty garlicky dressing. Have room temp as salad.

We're also going to treat as bitter gourd and have a curry.

We stuff them too but don't parboil. Just half, scoop, fry off middle with onions garlic eat. Tops in herbs, bread crumbs, feta, stuff and bake.

A fave in our house, courgettes and tomatoes.

Slice your courgettes, chuck into big hot pan with some olive oil, add a tin of tomatoes per courgette (depending on size), loads of garlic, some herbs esp basil and bay leaf, stock cube, pepper and as much wine as you can spare. Leave to simmer very low for as long as poss, when cool, freeze for winter use.

Best served with a lovely pork chop and some couscous, main meals with no work for the winter!

I was hoping for lots of courgettes this year, but something went wrong along the way as my three plants have stayed small and pretty, which really wasn't what I had in mind.

I was planning on making pickled zucchini or perhaps zucchini relish, and I have a recipe for Zany Zucchini Marmalade which sounds interesting.

We do courgettes stuffed with cous cous
Courgette soufflé-super yummy
Cougettes thinly sliced and fried withe lemon garlic, chilli and olive oil and tossed through pasta
Plus they pad our pretty much anything whether ids pasta sauce or fajitas
If they get to much I have a chutney glut

At least with courgettes you can do so much with it. One year we grew rainbow chard, I can't even look at the stuff now and definitely can't eat it it-ate it every night for months!

Courgette carbonara

Slice courgette into rounds. Pat dry in tea towel and squeeze a bit to get out the moisture. Heat up generous amount of olive oil in deep frying pan and fry the rounds with plenty of coarsely ground black pepper and fresh thyme.
Cook courgette rounds until browned but not mushy - spits like mad so a splash guard thingie is a good plan.
You may have to do the frying in several batches as you must cook the courgette in a single layer to avoid mushiness. Keep courgettes on plate on piece of kitchen roll until needed. Keep oil.
Mix up a couple of eggs and some single cream - may be 150 ml. Chuck in some coarsely grated parmesan .

When the pasta is cooked drain it and then mix it with the hot oil you used for the courgette and stir. Then pour in the egg cream mix then stir in the cooked courgette and then serve and eat far too much with lots more black pepper.

Apologies for slight random nature of paragraphs but phone is not cooperating.

Enjoy!

Boil water for pasta - penne rigati is my favourite for this. Cook pasta and drain - reserve a bit of the water - maybe a couple of table spoons.

Addendum. You need to stir in the cream egg mix and let it cook a bit before putting in the courgette.

And you need to stir in the reserved pasta water after you stir the pasta into the oil. You don't just keep it as a souvenir. Maybe I should retype the lot on the laptop later...

courgette cake wow thats a new one on me, where would i get a recipe for that? also any good courgette chutney recipes that you recommend, i've never made it before so simple is good! does it matter if i use yellow courgettes as thats what i have planted this year.

this courgette pesto

It's lovely with the bread (though we use wholemeal), but we do a huge batch and use it for courgette lasagne, courgette risotto, etc.

Courgette and parmesan tart
Courgettes stuffed with mince
ratatouille
courgette loaf

We do a quick and simple starter/side dish. You use the microwave, so perfect if your oven is already full (of other courgette based meals ).

Cut courgette into approx. 1 cm slices, brush with garlic infused olive oil, place in a dish and microwave for 2 mins.

Turn them over brush with garlic olive oil again and microwave for further 2 mins.

Put a slice of tomato on top of courgette slices (and more garlic if you like your food garlicky!), microwave for 2-3 mins.

Finally put a piece of goats cheese on top of each little stack and microwave again for 2 mins.

Told you it was simple (but delicious!)

We are having ratatouille tonight and veg curry tomorrow, mainly courgettes.

The Scallops family favourite is:

4 rashers of smoked bacon, diced
2 large courgettes, chopped into little quarters
1 garlic clove
creme fraiche
handfull of cheddar cheese
pasta

Brown bacon, add courgettes and garlic and fry until softened (but not too much). Turn off heat and add creme fraice and cheddar cheese.

As Gino says; Add the pasta to the sauce, not the sauce to the pasta.

I do a courgette pasta recipe, cubes of pancetta, grated courgettes, lemon zest, lemon juice, creme fraiche and Parmesan. Takes five minutes, DH loves it and he's a fussy bugger when it comes to pasta dishes.