Zucchini fritte is a fun twist on the classic summer veggie! Plus, it’s the perfect way to try out deep frying at home!
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Summertime in Italy means zucchini!
Shopping at the market in my town is a funny experience, because it’ll cost 1€ for 4 small zucchini or 2€ for a kilo (around 20). I usually end up buying way too much of whatever’s fresh, and we eat it at every meal for the week.
It’s been a fun way to experiment! Believe it or not, I haven’t really gotten tired of any veggies we’ve eaten this way. Plus, it prompts me to branch out of my typical veggie preparations. Especially during the summer when it’s too hot to turn on the oven!
On my zucchini week, I made grilled zucchini sandwiches, summer pasta, raw zucchini salad, zucchini bread, zucchini pasta sauce, and rounded out with zucchini fritte!
This really goes back to our three-month Italian lockdown: one of the weird hobbies/experiments I picked up was deep-frying things. I’m by no means an expert and still make Logan help every time, but we’ve made several kinds of fries.
Zucchini fritte is a great starter food to dip your toes in the world of frying, because they cook fast and you’re not going to undercook them. Once you feel confident here, the world of frying is your oyster!
Hopefully, this goes without saying, but deep frying comes with some serious safety considerations. If you’re not paying attention and being smart it can get dangerous really quickly, so just be smart here.
We bought a cheap pot just for deep frying as well as a candy thermometer. You can use a meat thermometer, but a candy one can sit in there the whole time which I find helpful. Keeping tabs on oil temperature is really important.
A few safety tips: use much bigger pot than you need. Seriously, we typically use a soup pot and then have less than two inches of oil in the bottom. It ensures you don’t have oil going everywhere or catching fire.
To make zucchini fritte, you want the oil temperature to be about 350°F. The nice thing is that they cook super fast, less than a minute, so you don’t have to worry about the oil losing a ton of temperature with each round of fries.
It’s no surprise that these bad boys taste best as soon as they’re cool enough to grab with your fingers! They don’t keep well. If you do have leftovers, heat them in the oven to give them a bit of their crispness back.
To get uniform fries, I used a mandoline. You don’t have to, but it does give that satisfyingly perfect shape.
Tools you’ll need: large pot, spider, candy thermometer, mandoline.
Zucchini Fritte
Ingredients
- 7 small zucchini
- 2 cups breadcrumbs
- 1 cup flour
- 3 eggs
- 1 Tbsp dried parsley
- 2 lt peanut oil or other frying oil
- salt & pepper to taste
Instructions
- Cut zucchini into ¼-inch fries. Set on a paper towel to dry a bit while you prepare everything else.
- Put your oil into a large stockpot and start heating. It needs to reach 350°F before you start frying anything.
- Set out three shallow bowls or plates with a lip. On the first put the flour, on the second put the eggs (lightly beaten with a fork), and on the third put the breadcrumbs and parsley.
- When the oil is to temperature, coat a handful of zucchini in flour, then egg, then breadcrumb. It's easiest if you keep one hand dry and one hand wet to minimize the mess.
- Drop the coated zucchini into the oil. Let cook for about 60 seconds – when they turn a beautiful golden brown, they're done!
- Remove from oil with a spider. Lay on a paper towel to soak up any excess oil and sprinkle with salt & pepper.
- Repeat until you've cooked all the zucchini!
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These look so tasty. I’ve never deep fried before, and have a mini deep fryer sitting in my kitchen I’ve been meaning to try so this would be perfect.
Ooh, this would be a cinch with a deep fryer!
This looks delicious. I’ve never actually deep fried anything…I think I might try. Thanks!
Give it a shot! It’s a fun skill to master with delicious results!
I’ve been waiting to do this for soooo long. Thanks for the recipe.
It’s so much fun! Enjoy!