Garden Surplus Pasta

I think I flagged this recipe the moment I saw it in the July issue of Gourmet magazine. Not only was it a good way to use corn and zucchini from the garden, but you also top it with bacon and cheese - what's not to love about that?

Zucchini, Corn, and Basil Pasta with Bacon

6 bacon slices

1 pound pasta (*see note)

3 ears corn, kernels cut from cob
1 1/2 pounds zucchini, coarsely chopped (1/2-inch pieces)
1 (5- to 7-ounce) container basil pesto (or homemade pesto)
grated Parmigiano-Reggiano

Cook bacon in a 12-inch heavy skillet over medium heat, turning occasionally, until crisp. Drain on paper towels; discard drippings from skillet.

Meanwhile, cook pasta in a pot of boiling salted water (3 tablespoons salt for 6 quart water) until al dente. Reserve 1/2 cup pasta-cooking water, then add vegetables to pasta in pot and cook, partially covered, 2 minutes (water will stop boiling). Drain.

Add pasta with vegetables to skillet along with pesto and 1/4 cup reserved cooking water and toss. Season with salt and moisten with additional cooking water if necessary.

Top with crumbled bacon, grated cheese, and freshly ground pepper.

Note: The original recipe calls for fusilli pasta . . . I used linguine, which worked okay - but next time I make it I will probably use fusilli, ziti, or even plain old macaroni. The long, slender noodles didn't work very well with the big pieces of zucchini and the small pieces of corn.

The Good Stuff

With all the celebrity chefs, beautiful glossy food magazines, and mouthwatering food blogs out there, it's easy to get caught up in the "glamor" of food. The professionally styled food photos, the exotic ingredients . . . especially when you're working on your own food blog. It's easy to lose sight of the good stuff.

Earlier this week, as I was visiting with my mom on the phone, she mentioned my miserable stuffed zucchini experience. She told me there was a great stuffed zucchini recipe from a neighbor in the Methodist Church cookbook. Now, let me pause and tell you about this cookbook. It is something of a phenomenon in my family. Throughout my childhood, both my parents were forever looking for their copy of the Methodist Church cookbook. Every recipe they were looking for seemed to be in that cookbook. Things got a little complicated when a new edition was released . . .

"Was it in the first edition or the second edition? Where is my first edition? I have a first edition at my house but I don't know if it is your first edition. Was her recipe for ___ in the first edition or the second edition? Ask your (mom/dad) if they have seen my Methodist Church cookbook; I need the recipe for ______. I think there is a recipe in the Methodist Church cookbook for that . . ."

It was, to my parents, what the Joy of Cooking is to some people. So how could this seemingly indispensable cookbook slip away from me? Easily, actually . . . it got lost in the shuffle of Bon Appetit, Gourmet, Food & Wine, The Barefoot Contessa, and all the beautiful food blogs in my google reader.

I received a copy of the Methodist Church cookbook as a wedding gift, with a very thoughtful inscription written inside the cover by the gift giver (second edition, by the way). But I hadn't even opened that very cover for well over a year. Until I went to find the good stuffed zucchini recipe, that is.

As you may have noticed in the picture, this post isn't really about the stuffed zucchini recipe; it's not in the second edition. However, as I flipped through the pages, thinking about all the great recipes so carefully submitted by all the great people from my hometown, one caught my eye. Zucchini bars. So, in the midst of the county fair, work, wedding season, and trying to protect my garden from the almost daily thunderstorms, I stopped everything to make zucchini bars.

I just baked them. I didn't even make the frosting. Nothing fancy, just good, moist, tender zucchini bars. I froze 3/4 of the batch and left the rest on the counter. When Ken got home from the fair tonight, I encouraged him to try the zucchini bars (I think he was a bit skeptical at first; after all, we have been eating a lot of zucchini). He loved them, and had seconds and thirds. I mentioned the frosting, which he quickly dismissed, saying they were so moist there was really no need for frosting . . . "they just couldn't be any better."

This zucchini experience has helped me regain my focus . . . it's not really about the pretty pictures or the exotic ingredients, or even how well your recipe experiments turn out or whether or not your garden looks good. Sharing your time, your talents, (your zucchini) and your favorite recipes with the friends and family you love . . . making them smile . . . that is the good stuff.

Zucchini Bars from the United Methodist Church cookbook

4 eggs
1 1/2 c. oil
2 c. sugar
2 c. grated zucchini
2 tsp. vanilla
2 1/2 c. flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 cup nuts (I used pecans)

Mix ingredients in order given and pour into a greased sheet cake pan. Bake at 325 degrees for 35 minutes.

Icing:
One 8 oz. pkg cream cheese
1 stick oleo (I would probably use butter)
1 lb. powdered sugar
1 c. nuts
2 tsp. vanilla

Beat all ingredients together and spread on cooled bars.

Zucchini (bread) for breakfast

I tried another zucchini bread recipe this week - this one from The Sisters' Cafe.
I added pistachios to the mix, and I'm still trying to decide how I feel about that addition.
Although we have a few loaves of zucchini bread in our freezer already, I'll probably make at least one more batch - using another different recipe. I have so much zucchini, I'm trying out all the zucchini bread recipes in hopes of finding a favorite to add to my permanent recipe collection. Let me know if you have a favorite zucchini bread recipe - I'll give it a try!

zucchini fever

It's that time of year. You know the time I'm talking about - when friends, co-workers, and even people you barely know offer to share zucchini. There are jokes about how you have to lock your car - not for fear of having your GPS stolen - but for fear of finding excess zucchini inside when you return. Every grocery store is stocked with it, every stand at the farmer's market has buckets and baskets full. Everyone with a garden is slicing, dicing, and shredding it, and it seems that every food blogger is writing about it. Yes, it's zucchini time.

I fall into several of these categories - I've shared, baked with, cooked with, sliced, shredded, and now blogged about zucchini. First, I made zucchini bread from The Silver Palate:

Next, I made pasta . . . zucchini fettuccine (say that five times in a row!). It was kind of a hybrid between the fettuccine recipe in The Splendid Table's How to Eat Supper and this recipe from Chronicles of a Fledgling Home Cook. Basically, the sauce was butter, cream, freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano, fresh basil, fresh oregano, salt and pepper (combine with sauteed zucchini and fettuccine cooked al dente). I added a little splash of fresh lemon juice just before serving, which made it extra delicious.













If you need even more zucchini ideas, the Pioneer Woman made farfalle with zucchini. Last summer, Molly at Orangette made pasta sauce with zucchini blossoms.

Still have extra zucchini? One of my favorite zucchini recipes is crispy zucchini coins from Cooking Light. By the way, Cooking Light has 292 zucchini recipes on its site. Heidi at 101 Cookbooks makes chocolate zucchini cupcakes. Truly, the options are endless. There's zucchini pizza, zucchini pie ("tastes like apple" - really?) . . . you can fry it, bake it, stuff it, grill it . . . but my favorite is to share it.
Anyone want some zucchini?