Courgette/Zucchini Fritters with Yoghurt Sauce

As so often in the summer, we have a glut of courgettes and the question becomes quite pressing what can be done with them. I had a vague memory about fritters with a kind of Levantine touch. So this is what I tried out – and if it exists in some national or regional cuisine, I can only plead that I worked this out by myself… It has to be said that apart from letting the courgettes sit in salt for twenty minutes, that’s the part that takes the longest: this is a quick meal.

What you need:

• 3 courgettes grated
• 1 tblsp salt
• 1 largish or 2 smaller onions or shallots
• a handful of herbs (parsley, coriander, lovage, thyme, oregano, etc.), in our case from the garden
• 3 eggs beaten
• a generous amount of oil for frying
• 3 good tblsp flour
• 2-300 ml Greek-style yoghurt
• a handful of mint
• 3 cloves garlic
• herb salt and cayenne pepper to taste

What you do:

1. Rub the grated courgettes with the salt and leave to drain in a sieve for at least 20 minutes, then squeeze the excess juice out (the drier the courgettes, the better).
2. In the meantime chop the herbs (without the mint) and the onion(s)/shallots, and mix with the eggs and the flower.
3. Add the grated courgettes and season to taste (salt and pepper, perhaps a touch of curry powder or, my option, Cajun spice).
4. In a frying pan, heat the oil and when it is hot, fry the fritters for about 2 to 3 minutes on each side. Drain of the excess fat with kitchen paper.
5. For the yoghurt sauce, chop the peppermint finely, squash the garlic and mix with the yoghurt, then season with herb salt and cayenne pepper.

Layered Rösti

I made this the other day for three, but with a big summer salad (tomatoes and cucumbers with an Italian dressing, i.e. salt, pepper, herbs, balsamic vinegar and olive oil) it can easily make a meal for four, as it ended up doing for us, unless these four are ravenous youngsters. It’s an easy meal and used up some of our plentiful garden veggies (courgettes and peppers). You could probably make a rösti from raw potatoes, but the two layers would take a little longer and somewhat more fat might be needed. 
 

What you need

• 2 medium onions chopped
• 5-8 cloves of garlic peeled and finely sliced
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 kg of waxy potatoes boiled in the jacket, ideally the day before, grated just before cooking (see note above if you are not that organised as is usually the case with me)
• 4 dollops of butter and 4 tsp sunflower or rapeseed oil for to fry the röstis an both sides.
• 2 medium courgettes, in thin slices
• 1 pepper (or two small ones in different colours for effect) in thin strips.
• salt, pepper and paprika, optionally mixed herbs
• 150 g alp cheese in sticks or thin slices

What you do

1.  Fry the onions and garlic in the olive oil until they are golden in colour.
2. Mix half with the grated potatoes.   
3. Preheat the oven to about 200° and allow a piece of butter to melt in a ceramic quiche dish.
4. In two frying pans melt a dollop of butter mixed with 1 tsp oil until it is hot, then add the potate/onion/garlic mixture and fry over a medium heat for about 15-20 minutes. It is done when the potatoes on the top look cooked.
5. Flip over with a plate and fry the other side until you have a golden brown crust.  
   
6. Mix the courgettes and the pepper into the remaining onions and sauté briefly. Season to taste with salt, pepper and paprika (and herbs).
7. Place one rösti into the bottom of the quiche dish, distribute the vegetables over the top and cover with the second rösti. Then cover the top evenly with the pieces of cheese.
8. Place in the oven and allow the cheese to form a crust.

 

 

Frittata with courgettes, olives and sun-dried tomatoes

Frittata is an Italian omelette which, for my taste, is the endlessly flexible quick-fix what-needs-using-up-in-the fridge meal. The only thing you really need to have is plenty of eggs. The following recipe is one that you can vary. I like it because it is reminiscent of summer tastes - which is not to say you can’t do it at any other time of year.In our garden, courgettes are of course always plentiful in summer. 

I got to know about frittata when going through one of my cooking bibles (more of which at a later stage), The Silver Spoon, Italy’s best-selling cookery book of the last 50 years.

What you need

All the amounts can be handled very flexibly. The ingredients can be varies almost endlessly.

• 5 eggs (or more), which should be really fresh. If you are worried about hygiene, wash the outside of the eggs before you break them.
• salt and pepper
• 15 to 20 olives, de-stoned and cut in half
• 10 slices of sun-dried tomatoes
• 1 medium-sized courgette, cut into 4 mm thick slices
• chopped and pre-sautéed spring onions 
• 2 cloves of garlic mashed (or more ...)
• 2 tablespoons of bread crumbs (optional)
• Fresh herbs (for example parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme, oregano, marjoram, lovage)
• olive oil for frying
• 3 tablespoons of parmesan or percorino romano, grated

What you do

Still a bit too runny on the top

1. Break the egs into a bowl and whisk till yolk and eggwhite are blended.
2. Add salt and pepper and the other ingredients (except the oil and the grated cheese) one by one and keep stirring to create an even mix.
3. Heat olive oil in a wide frying pan (I use an iron pan that isn’t coated but has through long use developed a great patina, which acts as well as a coating)
4. Pour in the mixture and make sure the solid bits are evenly spaced.
5. Cook slowly until the egg on the top is just about to solidify.
6. Liberally sprinkle with grated cheese.
7. Tilt the pan a little to let the frittata slip and quickly fold it over. You will find that that the underside is quite crispy whereas the top, now the inside, is still rather soft.
8. Turn to ensure that any bits that are too soft can get firmer and that the outside is equally browned on both sides.
9. Serve as quickly as possible because the centre should still be barely cooked.

One of my daughters has a deep-seated aversion to what she calls “slobbery” bits of egg. For those with a similar dislike, you can always keep the frittata warm in the oven for a few minutes. 

The colours on my amateur camera suggest that this one is burnt. It's not...

Some may have noticed that the sequence of herbs above is reminiscent of a song, Scarborough fair. As a matter of fact, parsley, sage, rosmary and thyme were meant to keep the devil away because what looks like two lovers making life difficult for each other is actually based on an old traditional song motive in which a human (the girl in the Scarborough fair) has to match everything the devil (the boy) throws at her linguistically. Singing about the devil was believed to have the potential of summoning him, hence the incantation of the apotropaic herbs.
This useless piece of information can be woven into an otherwise uneventful after-dinner conversation.

Oven Ratatouille

Not exacly quick, this may take 30 minutes in the oven, depending on how soft or how crunchy you want the veggies, it is nevertheless a quick and easy recipe that can be prepared in advance and briefly warmed up before serving.
What you need:

• 500g of tomates or cherry tomatoes, the riper the better
• 1 or 2 medium-sized courgettes/zucchini
• 1 small aubergine (if you don't like them you can leave them out)
• 1 yellow pepper (sweet)
• 1 green pepper (sweet) to add colour
• 1 chili pepper (more if you like it spicy, minus the seeds if you don't)
• finely chopped herbs (my choice would be rosemary, flatleaved parsley, lovage in moderate doses, oregano and thyme) to taste.
• 2 medium sizes spring onions (with green) 
• 4 or more cloves of garlic
• olive oil to grease an ovenproof dish generously and to sauté the onions and garlic
• a dash of Marsala or sherry
• salt and pepper

What you do:

1. Pour some olive oil into an ovenproof dish and make sure it is coated all round.
2. Cut the vegetables into pieces, tomatoes into cubes, aubergines and courgettes into slices and quarters, peppers into 1 cubes.
3. Salt and pepper to taste
4. Chop the spring onions with as much green as is usable and the garlic and fry in olive oil without letting it colour.
5. Add a good slug of Marsala or sherry (ca. 50 ml) and reduce the liquid briefly. 
6. Pour the onions and the juices over the the vegetables and put in the oven preheated to about 175°. 
7. Add the herbs (or leave this till about ten minutes before you take  the ratatouille out of the oven.
8. Roast the vegetables to a softness you like, anything between 20 and 40 minutes.
9. If the mixture looks dry, add a bit more Marsala
10. For a crisp top put under the grill for a couple of minutes.

Serve this either piping hot with fresh bread or as a vegetable sidedish with a meat (I don't really ever do this but am told it works well) or as tepid sort of salady dish on a hot summer evening.

This shows "one I prepared earlier"; it's not that dishes go from square to round in our oven...