what to do with zucchini…

It is the best time of year to make one of my very favorite dishes:  zucchini lunch.  Oh man! It is cooking on my stovetop right now, as I type.  The aroma is starving me, and launching my memory back 20 years…

It was the summer of 1991, just before my junior year in high school and my family had just moved to Bowling Green, Ohio.   There was a lot of “new” happening;  new house, new town, new church, new school, new classes and hopefully soon, new friends.

That summer passed by pretty slowly. In fact, it dragged on.   I remember specifically an older couple from the church my dad was pastoring invited us over for dinner one evening.  At just under 16, I remember thinking this would not be very exciting. In fact, I recall wishing Mom and Dad would let Marilyn and I stay home.  No luck.

So we went to dinner at the Harris home, not knowing what to expect.  And really, to most people, it wouldn’t seem as though anything extraordinary happened.  Except, it was special to me.  Mrs Harris had prepared Zucchini Lunch, along with several different kinds of salads and a good ol’ fashioned relish tray including some of her pickles.  She was an extraordinary cook and it was delicious.  But, more than that it was kind of reminiscent of eating  at my grandmothers home.  In short -for this young girl it was an evening of comfort.

In the middle of days and weeks of uncomfortable and adjustments, that little bit of hospitality, and zucchini, went a long way towards putting my heart at rest.

Long after that evening, before I left home and moved to Tennessee, I made sure that I had Mrs. Harris’ recipe for Zucchini Lunch in my possession.  Without fail, I make it several times every summer.  And I make it for others, because you never know how necessary that “zucchini kind of hospitality” might be for someone else!

So, what should you do with your zucchini?   Share it, bake goodies with it, cook it, soup it, sautee it, garlic-butter-parmesan broil it.  But whatever you do, give it with grace and love to someone, because your hospitality may be more important than you could possibly know.

Here it is!  Zucchini Lunch

This recipe is one of my favorites.  Its a calorie and a carb saver. I make it a lot in the summer because it is seriously delish with fresh veggies, but is good in the winter too.

ingredients:
1 lb ground beef (browned and drained)
2 c tomato – chopped and seeds removed
1 c diced onion
1 c diced celery
1/2 c diced green pepper (I added some red pepper this time, too)
3 c diced zucchini
1 pkg of sloppy joe seasoning
(maybe a tsp of sugar if your tomatoes are not very sweet – I never add sugar.)

Directions –
Chop all the stuff up. Brown the meat – in a larger pot, or electric skillet. Then add all of the ingredients into the skillet. Let it cook down to your desired consistency. I tend to let it cook on low for several hours til it is the consistency of a really thick sort of sauce or stew and all of the chunks kind of soften and disappear. When it reaches the thickness you like, you just stop the cooking.

I serve it over whole wheat pasta or brown rice. You could put it over a baked potato or eat it with tortilla chips, wrap it in a tortilla or eat it over a salad.  Completely versatile!

YUM!  Enjoy, from my heart to yours!