Inspired by including zucchini with Asian ingredients in Zucchini Green Curry and Thai Jasmine Rice, tempura with zucchini flowers are easy to cook and partner with seasonal dipping sauces and relish.
About Zucchini Flowers
If it is accepted that zucchini are 90% water, then making recipes that use the zucchini vegetable and the zucchini flower blossoms will add interest to meals without adding calories.
Paul Waddington in his Seasonal Food: A Guide to What’s in Season When and Why? (Eden Project Books, 2004) writes about the zucchini - they “grow both male and female flowers: the females mature into courgettes while the males just look pretty then fall off… The flowers are also part of the courgette-eating experience… their condition is a good indicator of how fresh the vegetable is”.
Zucchini Blossom Tempura
If gathering the zucchini from a home garden, receiving a gardener’s gift of vegetables with zucchini flowers attached or buying from a greengrocer or supermarket, do keep the flowers for eating with your zucchini recipe.
The unproductive male flowers can be eaten raw - like geranium flowers – as part of a summer garden salad. Make a quick tempura batter, coat each zucchini flower blossom in batter and deep-fry until the batter is golden. Alternatively follow the instructions of an Italian recipe for zucchini blossom.
Once cooled, these zucchini blossom tempura complement Asian main meals such as Zucchini Green Curry and Thai Jasmine Rice using zucchini or can be packed for a picnic or lunchbox with a sweet chilli dipping sauce or soured cream dip. Other suggestions for seasonal dips include the vibrant tasting and coral colored Capsium Sauce.
Red Capsium Sauce
Ingredients:
- 2 red capsicum peppers
- 1 medium onion
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 8 leaves of thai basil
- olive oil
Directions:
- Cut, deseed and flatten the capsium peppers into eight pieces.
- Grill the skins of the red capsium peppers under a hot grill until they are well cahrred.
- Remove from under the grill and set aside in a sealed container for 10 to 15 minutes.
- Peel off the skins of the grilled red capsium peppers.
- Fry the onion in the oil for 1 to 2 minutes until it softens.
- Then add the garlic to the onion and fry for 1 minute.
- Remove the onion and garlic from the heat and transfer to a small bowl.
- Add the red capsium peppers to the bowl and liquidise the ingredients until a smooth dip.
Seasonal recipes for late summer using zucchini or courgette include chocolate and zucchini loaf and zucchini loaf, a sweet or a savory bread.
Susan Morris - Susan Morris, Scottish food and drink business manager, organic gardener, author and editor
