Deep-fried zucchini blossoms delicious way to control crops
Serve cheese-stuffed flowers with marina
Zucchini are marquee items at your grocery stores right about now, but zucchini blossoms, which are generally not for sale at a standard grocery, are a different story. So this recipe for Stuffed Fried Zucchini Blossoms is aimed at home gardeners, who know two things for sure: First, like caterpillars to a butterfly, zucchini blossoms are the earlier life form of the zucchini squash. Second, they’re delicious.
I’ll add a third fact — gardeners looking to rein in their zucchini crop should zero in on the female flowers. That’s right — this flower comes in two genders. It’s the male’s job to pollinate the females, and the female flowers to develop into squash. If your garden is of manageable size, with no crying need for birth control, feel free to eat the blossoms of either the male or female zucchini. If, however, you want to keep the squash from overrunning your garden, harvest the female flowers. How can you tell the girls from the boys? The males have a single stamen in the middle of the flower. The females have shorter stems and multiple stigmas.
Cut the female flowers when the fruit has started to grow from them and is small — about 3 inches long — and very tender.
You’ll then be able to turn your harvest into the two-part appetizer — fried zucchini with a stuffed fried flower — on today’s menu.
Here I recommend stuffing the flower with smoked mozzarella, but any good melting cheese will work. Just be gentle when you’re stuffing because the flower tears easily. You want it to stay intact so that it keeps in the melted cheese.
The batter is a simple beer batter, crispy and light, and you can whip it up in minutes. Be sure to fry in oil with a high smoke point, such as peanut, safflower or sunflower. And please use a deep-fat thermometer to regulate a precise temperature.
The finished dish is yummy sprinkled with cheese and eaten straight up.
But I like to serve it with marinara sauce, which provides a tangy counterbalance.
Sara Moulton is host of public television’s Sara’s Weeknight Meals. She was executive chef at Gourmet magazine
for nearly 25 years and spent a decade on Food Network. Her latest cookbook is HomeCooking 101.