Zucchini Recipe Round-up

It's that time of year when, if you have a garden (or a friend with one), you've got zucchini coming out of your ears! Below is a little round-up of my favorite Forest Feast zucchini recipes.

Also, I am gearing up for my book launch events in NYC next week for The Forest Feast Gatherings! If you live in the NYC area, I hope you'll join us on Wed 9/21/16 in Brooklyn or Thurs 9/22/16 in Manhattan. 

This Vegan Zucchini Almond Bread is so moist and delicious! I've made this recipe so many times and it is consistently delicious. I make loaves and intend to keep them in the freezer, but they get eaten almost immediately.

This Zucchini Fan Quiche is easy, pretty and tasty and works well for breakfast, lunch or a light dinner. I serve it alongside soup or salad. It also does well when made ahead or packed in lunches.

These Zucchini Latkes are like little savory zucchini pancakes. Potato is mixed in to make them more filling. You can make mini ones for a party appetizer (or for kids) or larger ones for a dinner entree.

Use a peeler to make this Carrot-Zucchini Ribbon Salad. Feel free to skip the flowers if you can't find any. Serve the salad cold, or throw the ribbons in a big skillet for 1 or 2 minutes with some cooked fettuccine pasta and butter for a more filling dish. It's also great with pesto!

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Cheers to late summer cooking & baking!

Halloumi Grill Wraps

Labor Day is a favorite holiday weekend of mine since it marks our wedding anniversary (5 this year!). I am heading to Santa Barbara to stay at my aunt & uncle's beach house, perhaps my favorite place in the world, where we will probably BBQ every night! I think food cooked outdoors always tastes better, don't you?

I am always trying to brainstorm new ideas for bar-style serving at parties and included a lot of these types of ideas in my cookbook that comes out next month. Since I could basically live on grilled vegetables and cheese, I came up with this idea for wraps that works perfectly for laid-back BBQ entertaining. We recently stuffed BBQ veggies and grilled halloumi cheese into multigrain Flatout Flatbread wraps and it was a delicious combo! These flatbreads are super soft and tasty, and perfect for a meal-sized wrap.

Halloumi Grill Wraps

serves 4

8 oz Halloumi cheese

1 eggplant, 1 bell pepper and 1 zucchini

1 package of Flatout MultiGrain with Flax Flatbread

Garnish: tahini sauce or dressing, hot sauce and fresh herbs

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Slice the vegetables into long strips, drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper and then place on the BBQ until cooked. Slice the halloumi into long strips as well and place on the BBQ (it's a magical cheese that doesn't melt!). Make sure the strips aren't too thin or they'll fall through. The halloumi just needs to be warmed, so it won't need long. Warm the flatbreads over the grill if you like, but it's not mandatory since this variety is so fresh and soft. I like to place all the ingredients out on a buffet and let guests build their own wraps. 

For garnish: Place toppings in small bowls at the end of your buffet. For the tahini, I found a bottled tahini-lemon salad dressing that worked great, but some deli sections offer a standard white tahini sauce. As for hot sauce, I used Sriracha, and for the fresh herbs I used cilantro but parsley or basil would also be great!

Cheers to the last "official" weekend of summer. Hope you get some time to cook and eat outdoors. Happy BBQing!

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This post was done in partnership with Flatout Flatbread and all opinions are my own. Thank you for supporting the brands that make The Forest Feast possible!

FF Gatherings available for pre-order!

PRE-ORDER MY NEWEST COOKBOOK & RECEIVE A FREE GIFT!

I'm very excited to let you know that my newest cookbook, The Forest Feast Gatherings (a follow-up to my first book), is now available for pre-order and ships on 9/27! Pre-order it anywhere and then fill out the form below before 9/26/16 and we'll send you a free gift!

You can pre-order on any of these sites:

• Amazon

• Barnes & Noble

• Books-A-Million

• IndieBound

• Powells

• !ndigo

Fill out my online form.

Appetizer: Cherry Burrata Bites

The cherries are so juicy and sweet at our farmers market these days that I had to incorporate them into a summer appetizer. And burrata makes everything better, so why not combine them?!
It gets really warm out here in the woods during the summer, but the evenings can suddenly cool off, so we often pull our little portable campfire onto the deck. We had some friends over earlier this week and started with cocktails and these Cherry Burrata Bites. I used Flatout Flatbread’s Artisan Thin Pizza Crust and cut it into squares to form the base. I spread the squares out on a baking sheet, drizzled with olive oil, and toasted them to create large crackers that have both crunch and a bit of chewiness. I then topped them first with a few sprigs of fresh baby arugula, followed by a dollop of creamy burrata cheese, and lastly some cherry slices. Sprinkle with olive oil and coarse salt before serving and they are a delicious bite! I love the crunchy/creamy/salty/sweet combination, especially with a cocktail. Cheers to outdoor summer entertaining!

Cherry Burrata Bites

(makes about 16 bites, serves 4-6 as an appetizer)

• 2 sheets of Flatout Flatbread’s Artisan Thin Pizza Crust

• a handful of fresh baby arugula

• a large handful of fresh cherries (about 16 cherries)

• 6 oz burrata cheese

• olive oil and coarse sea salt

Cut the flatbread into 3-inch squares then lay out on one or 2 baking sheets. Drizzle with olive oil and a sprinkle of sea salt, then bake at 375ºF for 5 minutes to make the flatbread into crackers. Allow to cool then lay the squares out on a large platter. First lay a couple pieces of fresh baby arugula on each flatbread cracker. Then top the arugula with about 2t burrata cheese. Next put slices from 1 cherry on top of the cheese. (Instead of removing the pits, I just slice all the sides off.) Sprinkle the whole platter with olive oil and coarse sea salt and serve immediately!

This post was done in partnership with Flatout Flatbread. Thank you for supporting the brands that make The Forest Feast possible.
 

Foggy Plum Martini

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The wild plum trees in the woods are full of fruit right now. They are mini plums, just bigger than cherries, with a sweet and tangy finish. Every time I walk by one of the trees, I fill my pockets and pop them into my mouth, or save them to make salsa or put in cocktails!

Even though it’s summer, we have been getting a lot of coastal fog. Pescadero beach is just over the mountain, about 20 minutes away, and before the trees grew so tall, they say you could see the ocean from here. The fog is one of the things that drew me to this place- the soft, overcast light makes it an ideal place to shoot food outdoors. Fog is such a defining element of the Northern California landscape so it’s fitting that our local vodka distillery, Hangar 1 Vodka, is now using it to make a very unique spirit. They actually gather water from the fog to make their Fog Point Vodka (see a video of them doing it here, kind of amazing!) We have been in such a drought in California so it’s nice to see companies implementing creative ideas for water conservation.

This Fog Point Vodka is very special so I didn’t want to add too much to it to take away from the natural flavor. I simply shook it with ice, poured it into a stemless martini glass and garnished with whole fresh plums. (If you can’t find small plums, you can just use cherries or grapes.) We served these Foggy Plum Martinis alongside some Plum Pico de Gallo and it’s a fantastic combo for an outdoor gathering. Cheers to summer!

Foggy Plum Martini

(serves 1)

ice

3 oz Hangar 1 Fog Point Vodka

mini plums or cherries for garnish

Combine Fog Point Vodka and ice in a martini shaker and shake well. Pour the vodka into a stemless martini glass and garnish with whole mini plums or cherries. Enjoy immediately!

Plum Pico de Gallo

(serves 4)

3 black plums

2 large heirloom tomatoes

¼ of a red onion

2 T chopped fresh cilantro

juice from 2 limes

a splash of olive oil

a pinch of salt

Dice the plums, tomatoes and red onion and toss with all other ingredients. Serve alongside tortilla chips and a martini.

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This post was done in partnership with Hangar 1 Vodka, a local brand we love. Thank you for supporting the brands that make The Forest Feast possible.