Time for a little food porn - OR - Fun with courgettes

[spacedlaw]

Fun with courgettes (aka zucchini)

I have that thing about taking a perfectly wonderful sweet recipe (cakes, desserts, etc.) and translating them into something savoury. This is probably due to the fact that I am not attracted to sweet things (apart from my Love, but that’s another kettle of fish altogether).

So what happened now, is that I saw this amazing recipe for raspberry curd (I love Sichuan pepper so might HAVE to try it still) and decided to do something else entirely.
Something involving courgettes.
Because they are green and this is spring time (damnit) and spring time MUST be green.





I took
4 medium sized courgettes,
3 eggs (better if large)
100 g butter cut into chunks
A few sprigs of chives
Salt, pepper to taste

The courgettes were cleaned and chopped into large pieces then steamed for 10 minutes.



I let them cool a bit and puréed them in a blender with the chives. Add the eggs and blend again. Add salt and pepper to taste.



Transfer to a heavy bottomed pan and heat gently until the cream thickens, stirring all the time. The preparation should just simmer: boiling would cause the egg to curdle. If that happens however, do not fret: just put the sauce in the blender again and re-emulsify the whole lot, adding the cold butter piece after piece until smooth.




Let the courgette curd cool before pouring it into sterile container. You should be able to keep in the fridge for about 2 weeks.

Things you can do with this curd:

- Eat it straight out of the jar. No kidding: it’s wonderful both warm or cold.
- Spread it on bruschetta, or crêpes, or flat bread of any sort, etc…
- Use it as dip sauce
- Make verrines like this one, the curd replacing the carrot cream (the cheese topping would be excellent – sprinkle with roasted and chopped hazelnuts)
- Make a savoury pie, by layering the curd over a prebaked crust.



Here I have used one made of chopped hazelnuts, oats and butter – a trifle too flaky but wonderful all the same – but any favourite crust should work except – possibly - for puff pastry ones (it might not withstand the wetness of the curd) and baking in hot oven (180C) for 30 to 40 minutes.

You could even go one step further and use 4 eggs yolks for the curd and turn the whites into savoury meringue, turning the above pie into a savoury surprise twist on the traditional lemon meringue pie. In which case I would recommend dicing some feta on top of the curd before folding the whites on top…