Oh no! It happened again!
What in the world! Have you ever seen anything like it?
This is just crazy!
I love having a garden and growing zucchinis in it.
There are so many recipes I can make with these
beautiful green torpedo shape vegetables
like, the latest craze of noodling them instead of using pasta,
or giving it a toss with oil and vinegar and just plain grilling them.
YUUUM!
But what to do when you turn your back on the garden for a second
and you have a ginormous zucchini growing in your lil’ ol’ garden.
Have you ever noticed, that is exactly how it happens?
You see these beautiful orange blossoms and know,
hey, you’re gonna be a zucchini some day when you grow up.
Then it’s so fun to see the blossom fade and shrivel up
after a wonderful little honey bee has done it’s pollinating job,
and a tiny little zucchini starts to grow.
But here in lies the problem.
It grows, and grows, and grows,
until it’s so big that it’s just not as tasty anymore.
You catch a glimpse of this immature thing one day and say to yourself,
I’ll give you just a little more time to reach your potential,
and just like that, it’s colossal!
Even though people might be impressed with what they think is your expert gardening skills.
You really have them all fooled because it was your lack of watchfulness that let this vegetable get out of control.
Oh well, what to do, what to do?
Instead of making lemonade out of lemons,
I’ll make a zucchini boat out of this zucchini.
Oh, you don’t know what that is?
Hmmm, well let me fill you in.
It’s a delicious Italian like meat sauce
filled into a hollowed out boat of a zucchini.
Then topped with melted cheese to crown it all with the rich goodness that only melted cheese can accomplish.
It’s just plain old delicious, and yummy, and good,
and now that I think about it, I’m glad I slacked off a little.
Yes, I’m even thrilled. In fact, I think I meant to do that all along.
Nah, you know the truth.
It’s just a case of not crying, but solving the problem.
And a Zucchini Boat is a wonderful solution to a giant zucchini problem.
XO Jerri
ZUCCHINI BOAT RECIPE
INGREDIENTS
1 large zucchini cut in half length wise and hollowed out to leave canoe boat like shell
Olive oil to brush inside zucchini
1 pound ground beef
1 pound ground Italian sausage (or remove meat from Italian sausage links)
1 medium yellow onion chopped
3 cloves garlic minced
1 jar of your favorite marinara sauce
1 c each of hand grated mix of Mozzarella, Cheddar, and Monterey Jack cheeses
Parmesan cheese grated on top
salt and pepper to taste
3 tablespoons fresh herbs chopped (anything from your garden like basil, oregano, thyme)
DIRECTIONS
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- Set Zucchini the two zucchini halves on cookie sheet then brush with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.
- Bake in oven for 20 minutes. Take out and pour off any remaining liquid.
- Brown ground beef and sausage while zucchini is baking.
- Drain fat then add onion and garlic and keep sautéing until onions are soft.
- Add marinara sauce, 2 tablespoons of herbs and stir. Cover and simmer on low until zucchini is done.
- Take zucchini out of oven and spoon meat sauce inside of boats.
- Top with grated cheese and grate a little extra parmesan cheese to cover.
- Bake again in oven for 5-10 minutes just enough to melt cheese into a bubbly mess of goodness.
- Remove zucchini boats from oven letting them cool a bit. Sprinkle more fresh herbs before serving.
ENJOY