I often end up buying zucchini than I need for a certain dish as they often come in batches. But what to do with a single zucchini…you could make fritters.

Ingredients:

Sliced zucchini – however much you have.

1 egg (for 2/3 of a zucchini. If you have more, you might need to add an extra egg – but you can see as you go along)

1 clove minced garlic

1/2 cup flour

1/2 cup bread crumbs

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. pepper

1/4 cup vegetable oil

Method:

Rinse and slice the zucchini in slices of about 4 mm.

Add the flour to a plate.

In a bowl, whisk the egg together with the minced garlic.

On another plate, add the bread crumbs and mix these with salt and pepper.

Heat the oil in a frying pan – but be careful not to overheat, as it can catch fire. It is ready when you see a sizzle when dipping in a toothpick or adding a slice of zucchini.

Dip the slices of zucchini in flour, dip in the egg and finally dip the slices…one by one…in the bread crumbs. When they are all covered, add them to the hot oil and fry until golden and crisp (about 5 minutes). You might have to do a few batches depending on how many slices you have. It is important that they do not cover each other.

Carrots, potato and the stalk of a broccoli worked well together in this soup. To make it even more festive, I fried some bacon for topping.

Ingredients:

200 g carrots

200 g potatoes

100 g stalk of a broccoli

1 clove minced garlic

1 chopped medium onion

3 to 4 large spring onions (or alternatively 1 leek)

1 tbsp butter

2 tbsp oil

3 sprigs of parsley

the core stalks of 1 celery – with leaves

1 1/4 l. vegetable or chicken broth

1 tbsp salt

100 g of fried smoked finely diced fried bacon

Method:

Peel the potatoes, carrots and the stalk of the broccoli and dice them (approximately 2 x 2 cm). Set aside on a plate.

Finely chop or mince the garlic. Finely dice the onion and the spring onions keeping a handful of the green top for serving.

Rinse the parsley and the core stalks of the celery.

Add the butter and the oil to a large pot, heat it up at medium heat and let it melt – not brown. Add the onion, the garlic and spring onion (or leek) and fry this for approximately 5 minutes – until soft. Add the chopped vegetables and fry them together with the onions for another 5 minutes. Add the broth together with the whole parsley and celery. Let it all simmer under lid for about 20 minutes – until tender – at medium heat.

Remove the parsley and the celery.

Process the vegetables with a handheld blender (keep it well submerged in the pot to prevent it from spurting. The soup is hot! You don’t want to burn yourself.)

Add salt and serve topped with finely chopped fried smoked bacon and finely chopped or sliced green tops of the spring onion. If you have it on hand, it is also good with a small drizzle of chili infused olive oil.

I apologize for the terrible picture. I did not realize that it was out of focus until we had eaten the soup – it was too late to take another one. But I will make it again some day, and replace it 😉