Delicious Appetizers from the Garden

You may have noticed that restaurants are offering fried zucchini in season as an appetizer. Demarle products offer a healthier way to achieve the same taste with an added bonus of easy cleanup.

With fresh zucchini and yellow squash from the garden on the kitchen counter and company on the way, I decided to bake appetizers. I adapted the recipe for Zucchini Frippe from the DAH A Fresh Approach to Beginnings & Endings Cookbook to make it gluten free and less allergenic for me (egg whites only). And, since I was planning to serve them with dips, I did not add any seasoning.

3 yellow squash and 1 zucchini were cut on the diagonal in 1/4" slices. The slices were dipped in a whisked mixture of 2 egg whites and 1 T oil and then coated with a 1:1 mixture of shredded Parmesan cheese and GF bread crumbs. These were laid out on the large Silpat®/PBS and baked for 15 minutes at 375°.

I served them piping hot out of the oven with ranch dressing and sweet chili sauce for dipping. They were such a hit I did not get a picture of them before they disappeared! This tray of appetizers was devoured in no time by 5 adults, You may be thinking that anything coated with Parmesan cheese and dipped in sauce would taste good, but the yellow squash got even more compliments than the zucchini.  

This is a recipe worth passing on to you. So tasty and healthy! Thanks, Lavelle, for adapting a seasonal treat to the Demarle style of cooking!

Zucchini Fritte

Serves 6-8

By Lavelle Wallace

From the DAH A Fresh Approach to Beginnings & Endings Cookbook

Ingredients

1 8-10”Zucchini sliced on the oval ¼” thick

1-2 t chopped fresh herbs of choice (basil, oregano) optional

1 C Panko breadcrumbs

1C shredded Parmesan cheese

1 t sea salt

1 egg

1 t olive oil

Fritte is Italian for fried, but these have the same great taste without frying. My mother used to make the pan-fried version of these (without the Parmesan cheese) every summer when the squash was ripe. It was a family favorite. These are a great healthy beginning to any meal or an additional vegetable. They’re so easy to make because they are all cooked at the same time.

Directions

Place oven rack in enter position and preheat oven to 375°.

Place the Silpat® on the PBS and set aside. 

Prepare zucchini and herbs as listed above. 

In a mixing bowl, combine bread crumbs, parmesan cheese, sea salt and herbs. 

In a small bowl, whisk egg and olive oil. 

Dip zucchini slices into egg mixture and then into bread crumb mixture.

Place zucchini slices on the Silpat®. 

Bake for 12-16 minutes until golden brown. 

Remove from Silpat® and place on a serving plate. 

Serve hot or at room temperature.

Berry Good

Luscious berries are one of the perks of this time of year. While enjoying fresh fruit in season is amazing, nothing brings back the taste of summer as much as freezer-fresh berry desserts in the middle of winter. Berries frozen within hours of picking capture peek flavor for later enjoyment.

Freezing berries is as easy as pie with the non-stick Demarle Silpat®.  

5/6 of the half flat of raspberries easily fit stem-side down on the large Silpat®/PBS (which was perfect because I wanted to eat the rest!) 

Two trays of strawberries, in turn, and my project was almost complete. 

Once frozen, the berries easily roll up in the Silpat® and can then be funneled into freezer bags.

Filling the freezer bags is easier than it looks in the picture.  Doing it with one hand while holding a camera in the other guarantees spills, at least for me!


I also hand-picked berries of similar size off the Silpat® to package for strawberry pies.



This is the easiest process for freezing berries I've ever done. Try it; you'll like it!

Meals for One

Among my favorite skillet meals is a combo of fresh vegetables sauteed with precooked meat. Today I sauteed fresh yellow squash and zucchini from my garden along with Walla Walla sweet onion and a bit of garlic in grape seed oil.  Then I added some precooked ham for protein. Season with salt and pepper to taste for an easy, healthy meal.

 

Heat 1 T oil (I used grape seed) on med heat in DD 8" Sauté pan.

Add 1 clove crushed or minced garlic.

Slice 1 small yellow squash and 1 small zucchini.

Cut up about 1/4 Walla Walla sweet onion (to taste).

Add to saute pan and reduce heat a bit.

Cut up 4-6 oz precooked meat (I used ham); add when onions begin to clear.

Cook until veggies are just tender.

Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Serve hot.

Bon Appétit!!

 

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New Recipes

I love to eat out on the patio when the weather allows. Summer arrived yesterday, so I grilled wild salmon with the Demarle lemon/dill seasoning as a rub. Add to that corn on the cob steamed in the microwave with a bit of coconut oil (using the oval Flexipan® and the Octagonal Silpat® as a cover), and all I needed was a salad.

Fresh spinach from the garden with a few slices of tomatoes and vidalia onion dressing worked nicely.

Today I made a GF chocolate cake in the flower mold and topped it with a caramel glaze and roasted almonds.  My last-minute idea for decoration is a bit off-center (either me or the sloping dish), but it looks tasty.

I substituted a frozen banana for the water called for in the recipe and roasted raw almonds (170° for 20 minutes on the flexipat/med PBS) for the topping. The bullet ground them finer than I had in mind, so next time I'll use the food processor. 

The caramel sauce was made with 3/4 C brown sugar and 3T each milk (I used heavy whipping cream) and butter heated in the small DD saucepan on low until the sugar melted. 

Best to cool the sauce a bit before pouring on the cake. Poke holes in the cake with a toothpick before pouring for an even richer taste. 

Fun With Pastry Cutters

I prepared tiny treats for my Bunco group last tonight. I created a Mexican-themed canape and made the strawberry chocolate tartlets from our Desserts cookbook. Both are best served within half an hour of preparation, but are good cold.

First, I thought it would be fun to make canapes with corn tortillas (gluten-free) using the scalloped pastry cutter.  I started with standard unbaked corn tortillas.

I was able to get 4 cutouts from each tortilla. Yes, there was waste, but at a little over $2 for the entire package of tortillas, using 7-8 for this purpose wasn't expensive. And, my dogs were thrilled with the leftover treats. 

I laid them over the back of the mini-tartlet tray and baked them for 10 minutes at 350°. I thought they might  mold around the shape of the tray as they got warm. They did not, so next time I will just do them on the Silpat®.

I chopped about a third of an onion in the food processor, added a can of partially drained black beans, and pulsed until it was creamy (You could use any bean dip). After arranging the mini-tortillas on a Silpat®, I put about a teaspoon full of bean dip on each mini-tortilla and topped it with shredded cheddar and cojack cheese (Any prepackaged Mexican mix would work). I popped them back into the oven until the cheese melted. In the interim, I finely chopped a tomato by hand for the garnish. 

Best served popping hot out of the oven.

The trick to preparing the Strawberry Chocolate Tartlets is to make them uniform. The recipe calls for mid-size berries. If you've noticed, mid-sized strawberries are hard to find unless you pick your own or have a huge number from which to select. Long into the process, I discovered that if you cut off enough of the large berry, it will work just fine. It also leaves you with leftover sliced berries for your cereal in the morning :)  Since many in my Bunco group avoid caffeine late in the day, I made some without the chocolate chips. 

The process is straightforward. After cutting the pastry shapes and putting them into the mini-tartlet tray, cut the stem end of the strawberries, dip the end in sugar, and put them into the shells sugar-side down. Add 3 (or more!) chocolate chips to each. Bake at 350° for 20 minutes.  

Allow to cool a bit before serving.

© 2011 Kristi B. Weber, Independent Representative, Demarle at Home. All Rights Reserved

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© 2011 Kristi B. Weber, Independent Representative, Demarle at Home. All Rights Reserved