Zucchini are coming to the end of the season but in home gardens there still seem to be flowers.
A friend gave me some zucchini flowers; they are delicate and fragile and always a pleasure to receive.
The flowers have to be used quickly.
As you can see from the photo above I decided to make a quick pasta dish using zucchini and pine nuts. I have plenty of young rosemary twigs that are soft enough to chop finely.
If I had some stracciatella (a soft, fresh cheese) at home I would have added it after incorporating the pasta with the zucchini. I improvised and stirred 2 eggs with a fork and used this instead, after all , the word means little, torn rags or shreds and ‘Italian egg drop soup,’ is also called stracciatella. In this Roman soup , egg is stirred into the hot broth forming strands.
The free range eggs were very fresh and yellow.
I used butter for the cooking, because butter would brown the zucchini more effectively. I also like the taste of butter in cooking.
I used egg ribbon pasta and because the pasta cooks quickly I put on the pasta to cook while I finished the zucchini component.
Once the zucchini slices were coloured I added the pine nuts to toast.
I quickly added the zucchini flowers; they soon softened in the heat and did not need any further cooking.
I also added the stirred eggs and a ladle of the cooking water from the pasta. The heat, plus the water will cook the eggs and make them creamy.
Drain the pasta and incorporate the two together. I always add a blob of butter or a good drizzle of good extra virgin olive oil to any pasta I make.
The fresh taste of the ingredients is what I wanted and it was not necessary to add parmesan cheese, however, each to their taste!
See:
PASTA CON ZUCCHINE FRITTE (Pasta and fried zucchini)