Zucchini Patties
Today I have another not-zucchini-bread-or-zucchini-cake-or-zucchini-muffins recipe for you. Alas, it is not as healthy as yesterday's recipe.
It is, however, delicious, and it's a fairly unusual way to use zucchini. This recipe is from an old Taste of Home magazine, and the torn-out-page this recipe is one that had been sitting in my to-try pile for quite a while. As I mentioned yesterday, I'm not usually a fan of zucchini recipes unless they involve flour and sugar, so when I finally managed to get around to making these this summer I was surprised at how good the results were.
The original recipe is on the Taste of Home Website (printable in all sorts of sizes), but if you'd like to go through the recipe with me in pictures, then stay right here.
First, you mix some bread crumbs, seafood seasoning (Old Bay, to be specific!), and garlic powder. Since I never seem to have bread crumbs around, I just toast random heels and slices that I find in my freezer, cool them, and give them a whirl in my food processor. I add a little salt too, since the recipe calls for seasoned bread crumbs.
Then, you mix in some melted butter and an egg.
Now for the zucchini. First, you'll need to shred 2 ½ cups of zucchini.
Since zucchini is so full of water, you'll need to remove a good bit of it in order to make your patty mixture cohesive. The original recipe says to leave the zucchini to drain in a colander, but I find it to be much faster and more effective to use the dish towel method. Just put the zucchini in the middle of a non-fuzzy kitchen towel (it might leave a green stain on your towel, so use one you're not in love with), ball it up, and squeeze as much liquid out as you can. Your zucchini should look like this when you're done.
I figure that the liquid that gets squeezed out must be worth something, so I save it and use it to water my plants.
After you finish watering your plants, mix the zucchini and chopped onion into the cracker crumb mixture. This is a little difficult to do at first, but if you keep stirring, it will all eventually come together.
Once you've finished mixing, pour ¼ cup of flour into a small bowl. Then, working with about 1 tablespoon at a time, shape the zucchini mixture into small patties. Coat each patty in flour, and place on a baking sheet.
Heat ½ cup vegetable oil in a small skillet, and fry patties, a few at a time, for 3-4 minutes on each side. Drain on paper towels.
Before I continue, I should tell you that details are not my strong suit. I'm the sort of person who does a complicated algebra problem but gets it wrong because of a copying mistake. I've obviously not outgrown this tendency because it was only when I was typing this recipe that it occured to me that I've been frying these all wrong. I've been doing more of a deep fry, and they're actually supposed to be pan-fried (i.e. not floating in oil). So, I will try making them that way next time.
I can tell you, though, that deep-fried zucchini patties are really good. This is not surprising, because I don't know that I've ever met a deep-fried food item that wasn't really good.
I'm pretty sure the pan-fried variety will be good too, though, and they should be a bit less messy to make. I'll let you know when I try!
The original recipe has an accompanying dill dip, which I have not bothered to make. I think the patties are just fine on their own.
As I mentioned, the Taste of Home site offers this recipe in a variety of printable formats, but just in case that doesn't work for you, here's the recipe with my modifications.
Zucchini Patties
Dip
¾ cup sour cream
2 tablespoons minced fresh dill
1 teaspoon lemon juice
⅛ teaspoon salt
⅛ teaspoon pepper
Patties
1 cup seasoned bread crumbs(I make my own from plain bread and just add a bit of salt)
1 teaspoon seafood seasoning
¼ teaspoon garlic powder
1 egg, beaten
2 tablespoons butter, melted
2-½ cups shredded zucchini
1 large carrot, chopped (I don't add this because no one in my family likes cooked carrots)
¼ cup finely chopped onion
¼ cup all-purpose flour
½ cup vegetable oil
For dip, in a small bowl, combine the first five ingredients. Cover and refrigerate until serving.
In a large bowl, combine the bread crumbs, seafood seasoning and garlic powder. Stir in egg and butter until blended.
Using a tea towel, squeeze excess liquid from zucchini. Add onion and zucchini to the bread crumb mixture. Mix well. Place flour in a shallow bowl. Shape zucchini mixture into 24 small patties; coat with flour.
Heat oil in a large skillet; fry patties, a few at a time, for 3-4 minutes on each side or until lightly browned. Drain on paper towels. Serve with dip.
Those sound good. I have a yellow squash plant that won't stop producing and I am sick of them! This sounds like a good way to eat a few more. Thanks.
This sounds good altho for about 30 years I've used the following recipe:
In large bowl stir together 1/3 cup biscuit mix, 1/4 cup parmesean cheese, 1/8 tsp pepper - stir in 2 slightly beaten eggs just till moistened. Stir in 2 cups shredded unpeeled zucchini (about 2 medium). Drop by heaping serving size tablespoon into skillet with 2 Tbsp melted butter and 1 Tbsp oil. Fry on one side till crispy brown, turn do the other side. Cook about 4-6 at a time. Serve hot. Makes 12 Can keep first batch warm in oven while second batch cooks.
Changes I've tried - swiss cheese or cheddar cheddar; added Italian seasoning, Old Bay, garlic; also tossed in minced fresh parsley, minced fresh sage, etc depends on what I'm serving with it.
I've also cooked these on a cast iron skillet on the grill while doing burgers - kept all the heat out of the kitchen.
Use your zucchini juice in soup base, spaghetti sauce, as liquid in muffins or bread (OK they'll turn out a little green), or mix with juice to drink/freeze as popcicles.
I think I might need to pick up some zucchini this week at the farmer's market. I have a hard time getting my husband to eat veggies but this might do the trick.
My neigbor came over a couple of weeks ago with a GIANT zucchini, tomatoes and squash ( I am SO blessed). I used the squash to make a casserole then discovered the same recipe worked beautifully with zucchini!
My freezer is now full of nice servings of squash casserole and zucchini casserole. Next blessing my next door will be BLUEBERRIES!
Love the recipes Kristen and of course love your photos!
That looks super yummy. I love fried zucchini from Carl's Jr. Looks like it might be kinda similar to that (although they just slice, bread and fry theirs).
For folks worried about the extra oil from the frying, I bet you could just bake those since you have them all lined up on the pan like cookies. We did that when we made falafels, and baking turned out just as good as frying. Sadly, my zucchini vines have all wilted and died out. We've been buying some, but have used it all up in a [L=Summer Vegetable Gratin]http://www.cooksillustrated.com/recipes/detail.asp?docid=14780[/L]
It is fantastic.
Sorry, tried to make the link work, and it obviously didn't. Cut and paste:
Summer Vegetable Gratin
http://www.cooksillustrated.com/recipes/detail.asp?docid=14780
Kristen- I made these last night without deep frying, just saute in a light coat of olive oil. They were delicious, my husband and I both loved them.
I made a bunch of these this past summer (we grew a bunch of zucchini and yellow squash plants), let them cool, put in freezer bags and froze. I love being able to whip them out of the freezer, pop em in my toaster oven and enjoy.
I love zucchini but run out of ways to use it before we get tired of eating it. I can't wait to try these! Thanks so much! 🙂
Okay, this is for sure happening at my house! I cannot wait! Thank you for linking me the recipe on twitter!
the recipes look ausome. I have got plenty of zucchini to test out
send me more
Try them with a bit of crumbled Feta Cheese, and go low on the salt for taste. It is so yummy!
I'm so glad that I came across this recipe. I have zucchini in our garden that's growing and I was wondering how I was going to cook it once it's ready to pick. I think that everyone in our family will enjoy theses too and sneaking vegetables past my 3 year old isn't always easy!
Kristen, I'm not much of a poster, I mostly just eagerly look forward to reading and rereading your daily blogs. However, today I thought I'd post a comment. I followed a link on your blog to this recipe and, having a zucchini in my fridge from my MIL, I decided to give it a try. Let me just say, thank you!! This recipe is fabulous! My sister, my husband, and I all loved it. I have no ideas on how to cook zucchini and squash, so this post was a great find for me. I tweaked it a bit, to match my kitchen. Having no onion in the house, I finely minced a jalapeno from my garden and threw that in. I also don't have any Old Bay (I keep meaning to pick some up!) so I just mixed some random herbs and spices (Paprika, a little Thyme, and garlic salt) and put that in. Anyway, thanks for the recipe, I know this post is quite old so I hope you see it! (via email or whatever). Also, I see a great role model in you. (No pressure!) I got married about a year ago and as I read your blog and learn about your family and your life, YOU are what I want to become! Your kids are home schooled (so was I), but still sociable and fun, you love and support your husband in every way you can, you are a Christian, you love to cook and even bake your own bread! (I was in charge of baking our bread for the week every week, as a kid.) Keep being awesome, ma'am. Someday I'll write a blog and it will probably be pretty similar to yours! And hopefully just as organized!
One last thing, I think from posts and stuff I've gathered that you live in VA. I am in Winston Salem (I am NOT trying to be a creeper). There is a thrift store down here that you would LOVE called Mega Thrift. Idk how far you are from WS, but if it's within a couple hours, you should definitely check it out. It's twice as good as Goodwill! I have in my closet about 35 dresses, probably 28 of which I got from MT. The most I payed for one is $3.50 and it's from H&M. you can check them out at megathrift.com or on their facebook. (I'm not associated, just a huge fan!) Soo, that's all. Thanks for posting!
Just made these for lunch today! Thank goodness you have a search feature on your blog. I had a farmshare zucchini and some carrots to use up, and managed to make these without having to leave the house for ingredients. Always a plus! Even my vegetable-indifferent boyfriend loved them. I had four just while cooking.
I'm glad you enjoyed the recipe! It is mine I submitted to Taste of Home years ago-- try the Dill Dip-- it is so tasty with these! I also don't always pan fry them, I bake them successfully with a well-greased baking sheet and take them out half way to flip them. Turns out excellent!