What Should You Do If You Have Too Many Zucchini?

You make Italian Keto Zucchini Fritters, which are to die for dipped in Canadian Maple Syrup.

Italians take their food seriously, so if you ever plan to deviate from a traditional recipe, do it cautiously.

Depending on what region of Italy you are from, you may call zucchini fritters various names.

Perhaps your Nonna, Nonno, or parents have called them one of the following names below, but they all taste delicious and are a must-try for any zucchini lover.

Zucchini fritters are a staple in almost every Italian household, and nearly every Italian has a vast garden, which means lots of zucchini.

The zucchini fritters take on many Italian names, Pitticelle Cucuzze, or you might have heard Pah-TAL-ee, Frittelle di Zucchine, Pitticelle di Zucchine especially if your family is from Calabria.

Those of you visiting the blog from the UK or other countries may be searching for Italian Courgette Fritters, and you’ve found them.

Zucchini vs. Zucchini Blossoms

If you are fortunate to have zucchini blossoms which are orange in color and very fragile, along with organic zucchini, you can make authentic Fratelli (fritters).

For this recipe, we decided to go gluten-free, low-carb keto for my wife, although we both love the Calabrese zucchini fritters the authentic way.

To stick with tradition, all you have to do is add 1 cup of all-purpose flour instead of the coconut flour, and you’ve got your zucchini fritters batter made the original way.

Inspect the orange zucchini blossoms, gently wash them to clean, cut them into strips, and add them to the batter.

Adding 2 or 3 blossoms to this recipe won’t change it much.

For our recipe, we didn’t have any zucchini blossoms this year since my father-in-law passed away, and we had no garden to pick from.

It was nice to have free organic veggies every year, and most certainly something we never took for granted.

I remember in the summer he would have these monster zucchini and hand us a few.

Mrs. CBB and I would look at each other and wonder what we would do with them.

Different Ways To Use Zucchini

Over the years, we’ve come up with our traditional recipes that incorporate Italian heritage, such as zucchini rolls and zucchini pasta, or zoodles as they are known.

You can even use zucchini to make lovely zucchini lasagna by replacing the lasagna noodles with thin, long strips of zucchini slices.

He would never pick zucchini when they are small, which you find at the grocery store.

He would let them grow until their maximum size before picking. It makes sense, though, if you think about it.

If you could feed ten people from one zucchini, why not let it grow instead of picking it small and feeding two people?

Unfortunately our yard is too small to have a garden with all his vegetable blessings, although we do plant as much as we can with our space.

We also use pots to grow herbs, which visitors will see as soon as they come to the front of our house as they blanket our walkway and smell gorgeous.

There isn’t a time when someone doesn’t tell us how wonderful our herbs look.

We take pride in them since we use them all summer in just about all our recipes, just like this one.

The zucchini for this recipe was gifted to us by a generous lady in our community, so we put them to use right away as we knew exactly what we wanted to make.

We weren’t sure about how to make zucchini fritters low-carb and without gluten.

We didn’t have any almond flour on hand, so we decided to go with the coconut flour for this recipe, but only one tablespoon, as coconut flour absorbs quite a bit of liquid.

How To Prepare Zucchini

Cooking with zucchini can be tricky, especially if you aren’t aware of the amount of water they comprise.

Like cucumber, the zucchini is mainly water, so drain and squeeze it dry before making your zucchini fritters.

Some people like to peel and then clean the seeds from the zucchini inside and then cut thin slices.

This is perfectly fine to do for this recipe, but we decided to shred the zucchini instead.

We opted to keep the peel on and not take anything from the middle as they were baby zucchini, which doesn’t yield many seeds, and the skin is so fresh.

You can, however, peel the zucchini if you fancy it that way.

Once we shredded the zucchini, we put it in a cheesecloth and squeezed as much water as possible.

Then we put it into a Tupperware container mixed with salt to draw the water out and topped it with a paper towel.

From there, we closed the lid and set the container upside down in the refrigerator overnight.

By the next day, the water had drained into the paper towel, and with one more gentle squeeze, the zucchini was ready to go.

You don’t have to refrigerate it overnight, but we did it this way to ensure the water was fully drained.

You can way something heavy over your cut or shredded zucchini and let it sit for an hour if you are pressed for time (no pun intended).

The strict draining is because you want your zucchini fritters to be crispy and not mushy, which will happen if you keep too much moisture in your zucchini.

How to make Italian Keto Zucchini Fritters

Look, everyone, my first cooking video…yay!!

https://digitalskyweb.co/canadianbudgetbinder.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/frying-zucchini-fritters-1.mp4

When making keto zucchini fritters, there are must-have components if you want them to be authentic.

You don’t have to have the blossoms, but they are lovely.

Besides the flowers, you must have the following;

• Parmigiano Reggiano cheese
• Pecorino Romano cheese
• salt
• baking powder (optional)
• pepper
• eggs
• garlic
• fresh chives,
• fresh parsley
• fresh basil

Those are the fundamental summer herbs for any Italian garden and are used in many Italian recipes.

Luckily, we have all those herbs growing in pots, so we don’t have to run and buy them from the grocery store.

Using a good quality extra-virgin olive oil or butter ghee and a deep-frying pan, heat to frying temperature and drop spoonfuls of the batter into the oil.

With these being gluten-free, we used the back end of the spoon to press them down and round them out perfectly.

Authentic Italian zucchini fritters are random sizes and perhaps not perfectly shaped, but it’s up to you.

The zucchini fritters don’t take long to fry, so don’t walk away from the frying pan.

As the bottom becomes golden brown, flip each one over for another minute and then set it in a dish to drain with some paper towel.

Once drained, move to another dish and add more Italian fairy dust, grated Parmigiano cheese.

Italian Zucchini Fritters Pitticelle Cucuzze (Keto)

• Recipe Type: Snack
• Cuisine: Italian
• Author: Mr.CBB
• Prep time: 20 mins
• Cook time: 3 mins
• Total time: 23 mins
• Serves: 15

These low-carb, gluten-free Italian Zucchini Fritters are perfect for a snack or to eat as part of a meal.

Ingredients

• 2 small zucchini peeled and grated
• 2 large eggs
• 1 cup grated Parmigiano Regianno (reserve a bit for the top after frying)
• 1 cup grated romano cheese (reserve a bit for the top after frying)
• 1/4 cup grated asiago cheese (optional)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon coconut flour
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 3 cloves of fresh minced garlic
• 1 cup fresh basil chopped
• 1 cup fresh parsley chopped
• 1/2 cup fresh chives chopped
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• extra virgin olive oil for frying

Instructions

1. Peel your zucchini and grate (if you are using large zucchini, clean the seeds out first but the small zucchini typically don’t have any)
2. Place in a cheesecloth or strainer and squeeze as much water from them as possible. Put into a bowl or plastic container with the salt and place in the refrigerator overnight with a paper towel over the top to absorb the water.
3. The next day gives the grated zucchini another squeeze to drain any remaining water.
4. Add all the ingredients in a large bowl and mix them to form a batter.
5. Add extra virgin olive oil and heat on medium-high heat in a large skillet that is deep enough for frying.
6. Drop equal spoonfuls of the batter into the hot oil for frying.
7. Using the back of your spoon, press down on the batter to form patties, or leave them as they are.
8. Once the bottom is golden, about 1-2 minutes, flip to the other side and do the same, which shouldn’t take too long, about a minute or so.
9. Remove and place on a paper towel to drain and add them to a dish where you can add more cheese and sprinkle with fresh parsley and basil before serving.

Notes

1. These should take 2-3 minutes each to fry and give you around 15, depending on how little or big you make them.
2. If you choose not to refrigerate the zucchini overnight, squeeze the water, and press for an hour, the prep time will be 1 hour 20 minutes. If you leave overnight, you can add however many hours you refrigerate to your prep time.
3. The net carbs will change if you opt not to use coconut flour. You don’t have to use coconut flour.

You can eat these zucchini fritters as snacks or freeze them for later use.

If we have lovely juicy tomatoes, we like to make a tomato salad on the side to make a lovely summer lunch or dinner.

We’ve had zucchini fritters in both the authentic Italian way and now the Keto/Low-Carb way; both are delicious.

Discussion: What keto recipes do you like to make with zucchini?

Net Carbs: 1.5g per each keto zucchini Fritter

• Italian Fried Zucchini Flower Fritters (Pitticelle Cucuzza)
• Ricotta Stuffed Zucchini Roll-Ups (Keto and Non Keto)
• Quick and Easy Zucchini Casserole
• Crispy Parmesan Crusted Baked Zucchini Chips (Low-Carb)
• Keto Zucchini Bread With Buttercream Frosting