Pizza Casserole with Zucchini Crust

Are you inundated with zucchini from the garden? Tired of making zucchini bread?

Yeah, we thought so (we are too).

Then we've got another question for you: Do you like pizza? Do your kids?

If the answer is "yes," we’ve got a recipe you're going to want to try.

It's simple, really. Mix shredded drained zucchini with eggs and cheese. Spread it into a casserole dish and bake it for a while.

Then top it with all of your favorite pizza toppings. Voila! 

This casserole combines everything that’s great about pizza with a vegetable-laden crust that tastes fantastic.

We got the idea from an old trick Lo's mom used to do with leftover macaroni and cheese. She'd mix it with a couple of eggs, spread it into a baking pan and prebake it. Then she'd add tomato sauce and pizza toppings.  

As kids, we loved it.  

As an adult, I've occasionally remade the recipe just to relive the nostalgia. But, I've also started looking for other ways to achieve similar results.

This concept is similar -- but it sneaks in some extra vegetables. So, if you're a mom with picky kids, this recipe might just be something you want to tuck into your repertoire.

We'd be delighted to hear what your kids think.

Get the recipe: Zucchini Pizza Casserole

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Chicken Caccia-touille

Eggplant and zucchini both come around during the heat of summer when long, slow cooking is pretty much out of the question. In most cases, I'm doing all I can to avoid heating up the kitchen unnecessarily. But, sometimes I've got to make an exception.

The trip to the farmer's market this week produced a bumper crop of great stuff, including a few delicious "eight ball" zucchini, and one of my very favorite summer delicacies -- fairytale eggplants.

These purple beauties are not only cute as a button (measuring an inch or two long, and about 1/2 inch at their widest point), but they cook up like butter. One of my favorite things to do is to pop their stems off and roast (or grill) them.

In this particular case, we were experiencing a bit of a break from the summer heat. And I was brainstorming how to use some of the farmer's market vegetables in conjunction with some chicken pieces I had thawing in the refrigerator. I was craving comfort food, and I happened to have a couple of sweet peppers available out of my own garden, so my first impulse was to make a cacciatore. But, a better plan seemed to be to take the zucchini and eggplant and throw them together into a summer ratatouille.

The more I thought about it, the more I wondered what it would be like if I simply combined the two recipes into something completely different.

So, I took the vegetables and roasted them up nice and tender. And I threw together a chunky tomato sauce, fortified with sweet peppers, onions, and a liberal dose of red wine. Add to that a bit of herbs de provence (central to a good ratatouille)... and put the chicken on to simmer. When the chicken was tender, I tossed the reduced sauce with the roasted vegetables and called it dinner.

The resulting dish was far better than the sum of its parts. Succulent stewed chicken, tender-crisp summer vegetables, and a sauce riddled with wine and herbs.

This caccia-touille was one of the best things we've tasted in a very long time.

And we'll share. Cuz we're nice people that way!
Chicken Caccia-touille



©BURP! Where Food Happens

Zucchini Fries!

I'm not obsessed with making things healthier, especially if I have to sacrifice flavor in order to do it. But, when I find a way to create something that is both healthy and tasty, I'm a HUGE fan.

These veggie fries are an exceedingly good example of healthy cooking gone absolutely right. The relative ease of the recipe makes it even better. Just a bit of flour, some cornmeal, a few seasonings (this is a great place to get creative), and a couple of eggs... and you have yourself the makings for a snack that rivals french fries.

And what could be bad about that?
You'll catch us making these babies every chance we get. Especially right now when zucchini has gone wild at the farmer's market.

Don't make us be the only ones! Try them yourself.
Zucchini Oven Fries


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Left-Mex: Grilled Vegetable Enchiladas

I never mind when there are leftover grilled vegetables in the refrigerator. To me, they always portend something wonderful in the making.

This week, the grilled veggies included zucchini, eggplant, onions, peppers, and corn.
The something wonderful, as you will soon see, is enchiladas.

Now, don't go getting on my case here. I know that these are a fairly big departure from anything truly authentic. But, I also don't care. Because they're downright delicious.

First, we chopped up the vegetables. Not too finely -- but enough that they'd behave properly when wrapped. Then, we tossed them with a bit of chipotle powder and a hint of salt. Now, I understand that this looks like a veritable mess right now. But, trust me. Eventually it turns into something wonderful.
On this particular day, we had some hand-thrown flour tortillas in the fridge. So, those served as the base for our enchiladas. We took approximately 1/2 cup of the seasoned, chopped vegetables and threw them on top of each tortilla... rolling them up into snug little packets.
Which we threw into a pan that had been generously lined with enchilada sauce.
When we're not making our own sauce, we like this particular variety from Trader Joe's. It's afforable, tasty, and (most importantly) chile-based. We are NOT big fans of tomato-based enchilada sauces at our house. So, we take great pains to avoid them.
Once we filled all the enchiladas (in this case, we had enough filling for about 10 tortillas), we poured the remaining sauce over the top. Just look at how those babies glisten in the sun (that's very important)!
You'll note that, in a rare effort to be health conscious, we didn't put any cheese inside the enchiladas. Well, dont' be deceived. We just saved it all for the top.
After popping them in a 350ºF oven for about 20-25 minutes, they were transformed into a very lovely thing (or 10 very lovely things, if you want to get technical).
After the margarita I drank while putting together the enchiladas, my photography skills (what few I have) went down the drain, so you'll excuse this humble composition. It does showcase the melted cheese nicely, though...



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Grilled Vegetable Heaven... on a Sandwich

When we get back from the farmer's market at this time of the year, I can't resist making one of my favorite summer treats -- grilled vegetable sandwiches.

First, I take a pile of vegetables and chop them into sandwich-sized pieces. This week, we happened to have some locally grown hydroponic orange peppers, a few baby eggplants from the farmer's market, some yellow summer squash, and a few little sweet onions from our CSA.
After some quality time on the grill, those vibrantly lovely veggies were reduced to a fantastically delicious shadow of their former selves. I'll admit to slurping up a few of the slices of caramelized eggplant before they ever made it CLOSE to the sandwiches.
Before I get too far ahead of myself I'd better tell you that, just before we grilled up those veggies, I mixed up the real key to a good summer veggie sandwich. Garlic basil mayonnaise.
No, I didn't go through the trouble of making my own (though that's NEVER a bad idea). But, in this particular case, even the cheater's approach is nothing short of glorious. A bit of garlic and some chopped basil transforms ordinary jarred mayonnaise into something truly extraordinary. And trust me, you ain't lived until you've taken a whiff of this delicious mess!!
Slather some of that extraordinary mayo on one side of a loaf of asiago pesto foccaccia from the local bakery... and pile the veggies high! Grab a side of grilled corn on the cob, and I'm pretty sure you'll be good and satisfied.

Oh, yum!
This is local eating at its finest! And no recipes necessary.



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