Sunday, July 12, 2009

Zucchini bounty

No, I don't have a bounty out on the head of some zucchini... but I might pay you to take some of these zukes off our hands!


This is the harvest I picked this morning. When I went down to the garden to pick, I absolutely could not believe the sheer volume of fruit that was waiting for me on those zucchini plants! You can see the one on the left is humongous. There's another one like that still over in the garden - didn't have enough room to carry it back with me!


Here's the huge one cradled in my arm, just to give you an idea how big it is. It weighs 5 pounds. I don't know what I'm going to do with it because it isn't going to be worth a darn to eat (when they get this big they become very fibrous and no longer delicious). I think it's destined for the compost pile, sadly.


This book has been getting quite a workout in our kitchen this year. We made up many jars of black raspberry jam about a month ago, Dave has done up some pickles, and I just made pickled zucchini. I've never tried them before, but I figured what the heck? What else am I going to do with all these zukes? Make a pizza with them? Yes, please. I made a lovely, sauceless pizza today with the tiniest slices of zucchini on top, and mushrooms, and fresh basil and mozzarella and provolone cheeses, and lemon juice and salt and pepper. On fresh, homemade dough (I was inspired by this delicious-looking nonsense over on Smitten Kitchen, my new favorite recipe blog). It was devine.

For photos of the pickling and the pizza pie, head on over to my new photo blog (pickle pics today, pizza pics tomorrow)!

7 comments:

Gabrielle said...

I heard a joke about how people lock their cars in Minnesota in the summer because if they don't, someone will leave extra zucchini on their seats. You could always take a load to your nearest parking lot and spread the love...

Kelly said...

Woohoo! I saw those zucchinis today -- and the amazing plants they were growing on. Thanks, Heather, for the yummy, yummy veggie lasagna dinner tonight! Rick made it back with my computer (as you can see since I'm leaving a message!). I had a great time this evening and can't wait until Tuesday! (Beautiful photos on the photo blog of the canned zuchs too...)

Heather said...

Gabrielle - I've heard that joke too. I may have to resort to that. I actually meant to bring some of those in to work this morning, but I forgot! Dang it!

Kelly - Ha, I'm glad you got to see those monster plants first-hand. Now that you have your computer, I see you did NOT get to bed early! How very sweet of Rick to go back and get it for you. Wish we could have met him! I'll call you tonight so we can make our plans for tomorrow!

Creative Cards said...

Lovely harvest Heather....There are some great ways to eat and enjoy this wonderful veggie. I make relish with mine...my family loves it!! I make enough to last the year until next summer. Fab recipies out there. :)

Heather said...

Crista - Relish is something I never would have thought of w/zucchini, but it totally makes sense. What a good idea! Thank you for sharing that!

RuthieJ said...

Holy Cow Heather -- that's one supersized zucchini!
I have that canning book too. It's awesome!

Heather said...

Ruthie - Yup, it's a big'un. As I suspected, we had some bigger than that waiting for us when we got back from vacation!