Afraid I don’t have a recipe for you today – between returning from one trip, prepping for another, and the general distressing state of The News, I haven’t produced anything I felt confident sharing with you. You can see from my hashtag title here, though, what I’ve been up to. If you follow me on Instagram (or if you’ve checked out the little Igram photo further down the page recently), you’ll have seen that I’m aiding and abetting perhaps the most prolific zucchini plant I’ve ever encountered. From its rooted stem to the tips of its highest leaves it probably stands four and a half feet tall, and the dark green, curved baseball bats I’ve been snapping off the thing are both awe inspiring and distressing, since I’m running out of ideas to use them up. These aren’t zucchini anymore; they’re proper marrows. Look out neighbors… I’m almost to the point of leaving “gifts” on your doorsteps in the dead of night.

Since I don’t have a real post to share with you, I thought instead I’d tell you a few of the ways I’ve been working through my harvest. In addition to last week’s zucchini bread, I’ve dabbled in a goat cheese and zucchini tart, a triumphant ratatouille adapted from Thomas Keller’s confit byaldi, and a shower of thin slivers added to fajita vegetables. Tonight I’m planning what I hope will be a triumphant stuffed endeavor: ground lamb studded with toasted pine nuts, golden raisins, preserved lemon, plenty of dill, and some feta. Maybe a few garbanzo beans. Certainly an avalanche of bread crumbs to keep N. happy. I’ll hollow the central line of seeds out from one of the larger specimens and fill with my mixture, then roast until the crumbs are golden and the squash itself has softened.

Future ideas include breaded and fried slices, either crunched as an extravagant appetizer or stacked a la eggplant parmesan, replacements for lasagna noodles in a lighter, summery version of the baked pasta, and the ever popular “zoodles” with the spiralizer tool I keep forgetting I own. A friend is tracking down her mother’s old recipe for zucchini pickles, and I’m considering adding shreds to bread pudding, since the shelves of my freezer not weighed down with loaves of zucchini bread are filling up with sourdough crusts from our everyday loaves.

In the midst of all this, I have a tricky Chopped Challenge entree “basket” to deal with, which I hope I’ll have developments to report on soon…

What do you like to do with zucchini? What else should I try with my massive harvest? Leave me a comment, if you’re so inclined, and help me devour these monsters.