If you can’t take the heat…

I had the best time with my dear cousin during her stay. One of our adventures was to the north, to have lunch with great-grandma and grandma (Meg’s grandma and aunt, respectively, as Meg and I are actually second cousins. Love Italian families!). We went to the greatest organic brewery and lunched on macaroni and cheese, salmon cakes with organic local greens and fresh hot fries, and a glorious looking chicken sandwich with avocado. Heaven!

As a group of girls will do, no matter what the generation span (we had three generations with us, awesome!), we gossiped and chatted about our lives, loves and recent family news. My gainful unemployment was a hot topic, as was our wedding and Meg’s road trip to Oregon and back. I brought my great-grandma a jar of last week’s jam, which she loved, as I get my jam-making skills directly from her. Grandma brought me freshly picked zucchini from my Grandpa’s garden with a recipe that she makes every summer. I’d never heard of this recipe and asked a few questions about it. Apparently I don’t remember it from childhood summers because, well, I didn’t like zucchini as a kid. Who knew?

The temperature after lunch was pretty warm and continued to climb, the next day was a scorcher here in Northern Sonoma county. When you wake up in the morning to sunshine and no fog you know to prep yourself for a hot one. We haven’t had many of these hot days this summer, so when the temperature does spike no one is as ready for it as they think they are. My new found recipe for marinated zucchini was deployed for dinner that warm night and received with lots of yummy noises.

I’ve made the marinated zucchini recipe twice already in the last few days and can’t wait to share it with you. If you have a garden this is a great way to get rid of an overzealous squash plant’s work; it can be made in quantity and keeps for several days. If you make it in the morning (or the evening before for you working types), it won’t heat your kitchen on hot days and gives the zucchini time to sit and languish in the oil and vinegar. This couldn’t be simpler, and served with a cold piece of chicken or even just a green salad it’s the perfect hot day supper. It even makes a great sandwich for lunch the next day if you somehow end up with leftovers.

Marinated Zucchini, courtesy of my Grandma

– 1 lb fresh zucchini, sliced into 1/4″ thick rounds

– 1/4 c. olive oil

– 3-4 T. red wine vinegar

– 2-3 cloves of garlic, coarsely chopped

– Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat a skillet over medium-high heat for several minutes and add your oil. Working in batches, lightly brown your zucchini on both sides, taking care to lightly salt and pepper before flipping over. This only takes a minute or two for each side of the zucchini, try not to cook until it’s mushy. If need be turn your pan up a tick. If your oil starts to smoke at all adjust the temperature down a bit. Once brown on both sides, remove to a glass dish or non-reactive container for storage.

Turn the stove down to moderate heat and add your garlic and red wine vinegar. Stand back when you do this. If you’ve ever had a whiff of hot vinegar you remember picking yourself up off the ground afterward. It burns eyes and sinuses with aplomb! Swirl the oil-vinegar-garlic mixture around in the pan and let it bubble for a minute or two to reduce the vinegar a bit, and then pour the entire contents of the pan over the top of the zucchini and toss to coat. Let them sit on the counter until room temp, and then serve immediately or chill until needed. These are equally good cold (and I think better that way).

Enjoy, and mangia!