WHB # 107 - Zucchini Loaf

This dish is great for parties, as it's an ideal finger food to pass around with drinks. The original recipe was quite bland, so I added a few touches of my own, such as garlic (quite a lot of it), grated cheese and bacon or eggs. It's pretty much a type of quiche, but in the shape of a loaf. I've even cooked it in a camp oven buried in coals, while we were camping on the Murray River. I certainly never "roughed" it whilst camping, and the neighbouring campers really appreciated an elegant nibble whilst socialising. Unfortunately, so did the flies.

My camping days are now over...nothing but a 5 star hotel for me now, but I do miss the challenge of cooking in a camp oven, from stews to roasts, even Murray Cod risotto, fresh from the water. We often wondered what the "poor people" were doing.

This is a great recipe to use up those abundant zucchini we always complain about in the summer time. It's not ideal to freeze, but I can't see why you couldn't freeze the grated zucchini cooked in the garlic and butter. I might try that this year, as I have foolishly planted 3 zucchini plants, and I'm the only one that eats it. However, when it's buried in eggs, cheese, cream and bacon, for some reason the family decided that they DO like zucchini after all. Go figure.

Ingredients:

1 kg zucchini, trimmed
salt
60 g butter or margarine
3-4 cloves garlic, minced
6 eggs
300 mls cream
6 rashers of bacon (or use ham)
2 cups grated tasty cheese
Thinly sliced red capsicum
Chervil (or parsley) sprigs

Method:

Coarsely grate the zucchini into fine wire strainer.
Add salt, mix through and let sit to drain for at least an hour.
Grease loaf tine or terrine and line base with greaseproof paper.
Strain zucchini and squeeze out all of the moisture (you'll be left with about a cup and a half of zucchini)
Melt the butter in a large frying pan. Add zucchini and garlic and saute gently until soft, about 10 minutes (don't let it brown). Cool.
Whisk eggs, cream and grated cheese together. Add zucchini and season with freshly cracked black pepper.
Pour into prepared tin, cover surface with baking paper.
Place tin in baking dish filled with hot water to reach halfway up the sides of the loaf pan
Bake loaf for 1 hour 15 minutes, or until set and firm.
Leave in tin for 10 minutes, then turn onto serving dish; cool and chill.
Garnish with red pepper strips and chervil, and serve with garlic melba toasts.


By adding the cheese, you get a beautiful golden crust on the top, which when served is actually the bottom....yummy.





Kalyn, from Kalyn's Kitchen, is the hostess with the mostest this week. I just wish I had half her energy sometimes, as well as her dedication and enthusiasm.