Aimless Tangents

About this time of year most people with gardens and those who know people with gardens have zucchini coming out of their ears. A garden wasn’t in the cards for us this year but thankfully the local supermarket has had zucchini on sale lately.

Last grocery trip I snagged two medium size zucchini:

I thought about making zucchini bread but memories of the zucchini fries my mom would make when I was younger haunted me. I just didn’t want to stand over a vat of hot oil to get my fries. Enter oven baked zucchini fries, and they actually were crispy!

Cut the ends off of your zucchini, wash them, then halve them. Take the halves and cut in half again. Place the new halves cut side down and slice into fry shape. I ended up with a plate full.

In your breading bowl combine: 1 cup of bread crumbs, 3 heaping spoonfuls of flour, thyme, basil, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, Tony Chachere’s, and Nature’s Seasons.

Set up your work station. Plate of raw zucchini fries, bowl of egg and milk dredge, breading bowl, and cookie sheet that has been sprayed with non-stick cooking spray.

I started off dredging three to four pieces in the bowl, like this:

But quickly switched to doing 7 or 8 in a plastic bowl with a lid so I could shake them around and coat them much faster.

I only filled up my medium sized baking sheet:

So I had some zucchini left over. It will be frozen for later use in something.

Make sure your zucchini is in a single layer with some space around each piece. Place in a 400 degree oven for 7 minutes (if preheated) or 10 if not preheated.

I admit, at this point I was worried things were going to be mushy and gross. But I stuck with it and wanted to see what the final product would be.

Flip and bake for 10 more minutes. They looked like this fresh out of the oven.

And all plated up and ready to be devoured:

Even my zucchini hating husband liked these well enough. I am ashamed to admit that I ate them all. Every last one. But man were they good.