It may seem strange that an Italian vegetable would be so popular in the Deep South, and yet this is so. I don’t know how long this has been, but it must not be a very long time. Nevertheless, I had my first experience of zucchini before I was ten years old.
Our next-door neighbor (and Nannie’s contemporary) came over one afternoon and asked if we wanted some free zucchini. Her husband, she explained, kept a garden at their vacation home, and they were overrun with zucchini. Now, Nannie had never heard of zucchini, so the neighbor-lady had to explain that zucchini is a squash, that it’s very good to eat, and that you could either bread it and fry it, or fry it unbreaded and then cook it with onions and tomatoes (I have since prepared zucchini many other ways, including stuffing it with an Italian sausage/ground beef mixture, but I suppose the neighbor-lady was not really that experienced with zucchini) At any rate, Nannie graciously accepted the gift, and fixed us zucchini with onion and tomatoes the next day for dinner (the noon meal at our house, remember). I’ve been enjoying zucchini ever since.
Anyway, here’s a recipe for breaded fried zucchini,
1 medium- to large-sized zucchini squash, cut crosswise into 1/4- to 1/2-inch slices.
Egg wash.
All-purpose flour.
Salt.
Black pepper.
Dried and crushed sweet basil (optional).
Vegetable oil.
Prepare the egg wash by breaking an egg into a shallow bowl and then stirring the egg rapidly with a fork until the yolk and white are completely mixed.
Prepare each slice of squash as follows:
- Dip in the egg wash and coat the slice completely. Then allow any excess egg wash to drain back into the container.
- Season to taste with salt, pepper, and optionally, basil.
- Dredge lightly in the flour.
If you’d like crunchier fried zucchini, try repeating steps (1) through (3), above. If you do this, go easy on the seasonings each time, because you’ll be seasoning twice. Alternatively, you could omit step (2) on the first go-round, and season only on the second, or vice versa.
Pour just enough oil into a large, heavy skillet to coat the bottom completely. Place over MEDIUM heat and allow to come up to cooking temperature.
When the pan’s hot, place the breaded zucchini slices in the pan so that they don’t overlap. You want to cook the slices evenly, and if they overlap in the pan, this won’t happen.
Cook both sides of the zucchini slices until they are a golden-brown, a little darker than you would summer squash. Zucchini can be a bit more dense (i.e, weighs more per unit volume) than summer squash, and it takes longer to cook through.
Drain and serve immediately.
Note: Please, please don’t think I’m such an idiot that I actually do steps (1) through (3) - egg-washing, seasoning, and dredging - for each and every individual slice of zucchini. Steps (1) through (3) merely specify the order of operations. You don’t have to do them exactly as specified, and I don’t. What I do is, I egg-wash a batch of slices, then season the batch, then dredge the batch, and then repeat for the next batch, until I’ve done the lot.
Personally, I like the mouth-feel, the extra little something, that the zucchini skin gives to the finished dish, but this may not appeal to you. If the notion of leaving the skin on the squash clashes with your sensibilities, then do not hesitate to pare the skin off your zucchini before you slice it. You can remove all of the skin, or just part of it, as is often done with cucumbers.
Happy cooking!
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