Turkey Zucchini Spinach Burgers

I'm baking these on my roaster pan at 350 degrees.

Made 7 burgers of about 100 calories/20 grams protein each.

- 20 ounces ground turkey

- about 2 cups shredded zucchini

- about 2 cups raw organic spinach

For spices:

- 1 tsp ras el hanout

- 1 tablespoons raw chives

- 1/2 tsp ground pepper

- 1 tsp curry powder 

- 1 tsp parsley 

- 1 tsp cumin

- 1 tsp paprika

- 1 tsp garlic powder

- 1 TBS cheddar onion dip mix

Spam

My daughter has never had spam. I don't think this is a bad thing. For cultural reasons, I felt it necessary to expose her to this processed American classic. 

I noticed it at Bottom Dollar and grabbed it. I bought the generic version because I was too cheap to spend the extra fifty cents.

She loves it. Tried it cold and hot.

I served it fried with a side of zucchini.

Grilling

My husband realized that we hadn't had our grill out this summer... We both had a hankering for hamburgers so...

We made this masterpiece.

Local corn, silk removed, soaked in ice water 15 minutes than sprinkled with A1 dry rub and put on the grill for about 25 minutes. Turning frequently.

Hamburgers from the freezer. My husband had made hamburgers the last time he bought ground beef. We have a small charcoal grill, and he didn't expect them to cook so fast so dinner was 4 pm.

Local zucchini. Sliced. Marinaded in balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing and also sprinkled with the rub.

Pizza style zucchini

I wanted to make stuffed zucchini today but had nothing -- neither meat nor vegetarian substitute -- worthy of stuffing into it. So then I researched zucchini fries, but they were all seriously breaded and coated with butter, cheese and egg. That wasn't what I had in mind.

So, I peeled that big old zucchini and sliced it into pickle spear style pieces. I preheated my oven to 500. I then found some Wegmans Italian breadcrumbs. (I never buy breadcrumbs so my mother-in-law must have left them here.)

I lightly oiled my cookie sheets with my cold pressed extra virgin olive oil imported from Beirut.

Now, I learned long ago that some vegetables, like zucchini and eggplant, have enough moisture that they can hold some breadcrumbs with the normal egg coating. It won't get that thick coating, but a thin one. Like this:

I cooked them about 15 minutes, turning in the middle.

I layered them on a plate and put sauce on them. I sprinkled shredded Parmesan liberally on them and returned the plates to the still warm oven to melt the cheese.

I added a vegetarian breakfast patty to add more protein.

The whole family loved it.

Zucchini Kale Cakes

A variation of the Imus Ranch crabiless zucchini cakes, which the original recipe is a huge hit in this house.

Now, this variation I have not tasted yet, but it's the what-have-we-got mix.

In a large bowl, mix and form into patties:
- 1 cup shredded wilted kale
- 3 cups shredded zucchini, frozen last summer, thawed, drained, squeezed dry in a towel and now about 1.5 cups
- 1 egg
- 3 stalks chives from the garden
- 1.5 cups cornflake crumbs
- 1 teaspoon low sodium soy sauce
- about 4 tablespoons ranch dressing
- 1/2 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
- 2 tablespoons tzayiki (sp) dressing
- 1 tablespoon spicy brown mustard
- 1.5 cups assorted shredded cheese: havarti, extra sharp cheddar, parmesan
- 1 teaspoon country herb seasoning

Fry.

Steak and zucchini cakes

Little Miss came home from winter Girl Scout camp, and since it's New Year's Eve tonight and I work the closing shift, I made a hot meal for lunch.

Over the summer I froze some shredded zucchini, and today I retrieved a pack of about 3.5 cups. Once thawed and drained of excess moisture, the zucchini yields about two cups.

The zucchini cakes are a variation of the crabbi-less cakes in Deidre Imus' Imus Ranch Cookbook. Today I made a use-up-the-leftover-Christmas-cheese version.

I started with 1.5 cups of cornflake crumbs, probably about 1.5 cups of various cubed cheese that I broke into tiny shreds (Colby jack, Gouda, and tomato laughing cow). For seasonings, I added about 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning, 1 teaspoon lemon Dijon mustard, 1 tablespoon ranch dressing, 1 tablespoon mayo, and 1/2 teaspoon low sodium soy sauce. Add an egg, shape into patties and fry about five minutes on each side being careful not to let the cheese stick to the pan.

I made little steaks with a brandy cream sauce.

Both of these (the zucchini cakes and the steak in brandy cream sauce) I've blogged about before. They are family favorites.

Zucchini/squash boats

I hope this works. It always makes me nervous when I'm this avant garde.

We had a fridge full of yellow squash and zucchini given to us via the garden of a friend of a friend.

So we decided to stuff them and make 'boats.'

NOTE: do not try this unless you've read this whole entry and I say it comes out decent. Because I'm totally making this up, with no guidance.

INGREDIENTS:
- one yellow squash
- one zucchini
- extra virgin olive oil, cold-pressed
- salt
- garlic powder
- Italian seasoning
- two Morningstar breakfast patties
- 5.2 ounces Boursin shallot & chive Gourney cheese
- one egg
- about 1 cup corn flake crumbs (or bread crumbs)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Slice squash and zucchini in half long-ways and gut out the seeds with a spoon. (feed to tortoise if you have one, they love squash guts.)

Child can then use pastry brush to coat each half with olive oil. Sprinkle a pinch of salt and garlic to each and a hearty sprinkle of Italian seasoning.

In a bowl, mix cheese, breadcrumbs and egg. Stir into a filling. Mix in broken bits of vegetarian sausage patty.

Fill boats (the squash and zucchini) with filling. Assemble the halves back to whole vegetables. Wrap in aluminum foil. Bake 45 minutes.

Grating zucchini

I make Deidre Imus' Crabiless Crab Cakes often. Though I call them zucchini cakes. Her Imus Ranch cookbook has fabulous vegetarian/vegan recipes without a lot of fuss and fancy ingredients. Plus reading about the ranch is interesting.

But I digress.

My mother gave me two zucchini from a friend's garden. My daughter keeps asking for zucchini cakes, but I forgot and she leaves for camp today. Therefore I'm prepping zucchini for freezing. I normally grate, dry on dishtowels and freeze in bags of 2 cups each. When doing this, you have to watch the moisture level when you use the zucchini after freezing. Zucchini is normally wet and freezing and thawing really brings that moisture out.

I'm trying to dry my zucchini by baking it on a cookie sheet at 300 degrees, checking it every 5-7 minutes so I don't cook it.

Crazy Zucchini Cakes

Crazy Zucchini Cakes and mango slices

The Crabbiless Crab Cakes from the Imus cookbook are a favorite in this house, but no one -- until today -- has shared zucchini with me.

Clicking on the Imus link should take you into the recipes from that cookbook.

Tonight, I'm nervous as my mixture is feeling too wet and I mixed up some ingredients big time. Using up leftovers.

So, instead of regular cheese (they recommend soy cheese), I mixed cottage cheese, cheddar and smoked gouda.

Instead of breadcrumbs, I used homemade bread crumbs, cornflakes and wegmans whole grain breadcrumbs.

Monday: zucchini cakes aka crabbiless patties

For breakfast our daughter had two bowls of generic Peanut Butter Captain Crunch, then we went for a bike ride and she had a snack of trail mix, cinnamon grahams and dark chocolate powdered roasted almonds.

My husband and I had waffles with peanut butter for breakfast. He packed the leftover fish my mom (Mimi) made for our daughter Saturday night and some english muffins to make sandwiches for their lunch together, with a side of leftover vegetables and fries and sweet potato fries from the restaurant Friday night.

I packed leftover tuna casserole for my lunch, and threw some zucchini (already shredded) from the freezer into the fridge to thaw. We'll have zucchini cakes from the Imus Ranch cookbook for dinner. Click zucchini or Imus for more details. Deirdre Imus' cookbook is a great one for veg*ns.

Dinner Party

I am completely exhausted and I have one hour until it's time to set the table and two hours until time to start cooking dinner.

We started our day at Wegmans. I was thrilled to find a one-gallon glass sun tea pitcher for $5.99 but distraught to find pineapples were $3.99 and that cored pineapples were $5.99. That's nuts.

I spent $48.76, which I'm counting toward the August budget even though it's July 31. I was bummed about that until I remembered I bought the sun tea pitcher.

I bought:

• 2 pounds Wegman's butter, one salted, one unsalted, $1.50 each
• one pineapple, $3.99 (grrr)
• the large bottle of coffemate vanilla chai spice creamer, $2.99
• 2 pints heavy whipping cream, $1.49 each
• 3 packages of celestial seasoning tea (blueberry, almond, and berry), $2.29 each
• 1 liter of Orangina, $2.49
• 3/4 pound sliced ham from the deli, $4.31
• shredded gruyère (domestic?), $3.60
• smoked gouda, $3.47
• the sun tea jar, $5.99
• 3 lbs bananas, $1.09
• 6 ounces raspberries, $2.50
• strawberries, $2
• ground nutmeg, $2.99

Before we left, I made the pear soup and I had set the brioche out and shaped it. When we got home, I baked it and brewed iced tea (green with berry). Then we went to the liquor store for wine. My husband came home early for lunch, so we had leftover crêpes and then I prepped the pineapple crumble and the zucchini cakes.

At 3 p.m., I'll set the table.

At 4 p.m., I'll start the crôque monsieur.

When the crôque is in the oven, I'll fry the zucchini cakes. While we eat the first courses, the pineapple crumble will bake.

Recipes:
Follow these links:

• Brioche-- from The Paris Cookbook by Patricia Wells, also should be accessible via 'French,' 'bread,' and/or 'brioche.'
• Chilled Pear Soup-- Vegan, eileen bresslin
  
• Zucchini crabbiless cakes-- The Imus Ranch Cookbook, 'vegan' (Deirdre Imus calls it vegan even though she used eggs because she has her own chickens) and zucchini
• Perfumed Pineapple Crumble-- Venez Diner, C'est Prêt by Dominique Malet, follow pineapple or French or the name of the book
• Crôque Monsieur-- obviously French, it's from The Barefoot in Paris Cookbook by Ina garten
• Rye bread-- clicking on rye will show you all my experiments with rye flour

My daughter made me a lovely four-course meal:
Tomato salad (pictured)
Piled-High Sandwiches
A cheese and egg platter
Chocolate-Carrot Crumble

Crabbiless Crab Patties

This recipe comes from The Imus Ranch Cookbook. That particular cookbook considers itself vegan because they raise their own chickens and therefore have a comfort with eggs. If you are truly vegan, this recipe will not appeal to you.

For the everyday eater, this is a fabulous way to use up those zucchini from the garden, especially the big ones that may not longer be tender.

I will be making a version tonight that includes lemon-pepper cheese from the farm.

Crabiless Crab Cakes
By Deirdre Imus
From The Imus Ranch cookbook

2 cups grated zucchini (whether or not you skin it first is a personal preference)
1 cup seasoned breadcrumbs
3/4 cup soy or regular cheddar cheese (I have reduced this in the past)
1/2 cup finely diced red onion (I skip or replace with some chives or with a clove of garlic)
1 egg, lightly beaten
2 tablespoons vegan (soy) or regular mayo
1 teaspoon worcestershire sauce (I use soy sauce)
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/4 cup olive oil (for frying)

Combine everything but the oil in a big bowl, form into patties and fry. They suggest these amounts make six cakes. Cook over medium heat seven to ten minutes per side.

Thursday, July 23... Two days after the original post... I finally got the ingredients assembled to make this. That huge zucchini made about 13 cups grated zucchini. I froze about 5 cups in one bag, four in another and kept the remaining for a double batch of the crabbiless patties.

My ingredients
4.5 cups grated zucchini
3 cups Italian seasoned breadcrumbs
3/4 cup sheddar sharp cheddar
1/2 cup parmesan
1/4 lemon cheese spread from the farm
2 farm fresh brown eggs
2 teaspoons brown mustard
4 tablespoons safflower mayo
2 teaspoons reduced sodium soy sauce
1 teaspoon fresh grated four color pepper
2 teaspoons It's a Dilly
a random spattering of fresh chives

I got 11 patties yield. I layered five on paper towels to help absorb the moisture, covered with wax paper, another paper towel and then another five. I repeated one more time with the last lone pattie and then covered and placed in fridge until ready to cook.

Too much moisture and too rapid heat with make zucchini hash out of your patties. So cook carefully.