After taking a little blog break I’m excited for fall and all the great posts I’ve been cooking up to share with you! Fall is my favourite season and it always gets me in the mood for crafting and sewing so stay tuned.

Right now is an amazing time to be checking out farmers markets. There are so many around Calgary and the prices cant be beat! One of the veggies I like to buy lots of is zucchini. It’s so cheap and I’ve found a little goes a long way. I wanted to share some of the recipes I’ve tried and some I’m looking forward to trying. So if you planted zucs in your garden this year and have so many you can’t even give them away this is the post for you!

If you don’t know much about this yummy and versatile veggie here are some interesting facts.

• One zucchini has just 25 calories (compared to a baked potato, for example, which has 130 calories).
• A zucchini has more potassium than a banana
• The word zucchini comes from ‘zucca’ the Italian word for squash
• Biggest is NOT best. The most flavourful zucchinis are small- to medium-sized.
• The world’s largest zucchini on record was 69 1/2 inches long, and weighed 65 lbs. Bernard Lavery of Plymouth Devon, UK, grew the humongous veggie

For more facts check out The Food Channel’s Top 10 zucchini fun facts.

Here first are the recipes I’ve tried. Click on the picture for links to the full recipe.

Mexican Zucchini Cheese Soup

This soup was very quick and easy to make. it’s all done in one pot. I always read the reviews for recipes online. I find they can be very helpful and offer useful tips. The suggestion I followed was to use fresh tomatoes instead of canned and I think it was a good choice. I also used one fresh jalapeño instead of the canned chilli peppers. I like a mild to low spiciness and I felt it could of used a little more kick so next time I might add 1 1/2 jalapeños. Id say this is a good amount for 3 or 4 people. I ate it for supper twice and took it for lunch twice.

Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

There are many recipes for zucchini muffins out there. I took these over to my BF’s parents house and they were a big hit! The changes I made to the recipe was I only used 1 1/2 cups of sugar and I cut the oil to 1/2 a cup and added 1/2 cup of applesauce. I also sprinkled chocolate chips and sunflower seeds on top just before baking.

Baked zucchini sticks and sweet onion dip

This recipe is amazing! The site has lots of pics and easy instructions. I followed this one exactly. Just make sure to not cut your sticks too wide. This would be a good recipe for a mid to small zucchini. Save your monster zucs for a recipe where you grate it, that way you won’t waste the center. The dip is so yummy! we ate it after the sun went down on the patio after a hot day.

These are the recipes I want to try out next.

 

Stuffed zucchini

Oven baked zucchini chips

Zucchini cheddar hushpuppies

I hope these recipes have got you inspired. I know i got my stomach growling! Let me know what your fave zucchini recipes are or which you want to try out.