If you have a vegetable garden then this has probably happened to you. One day you go out and everything is still too small to pick. You go back what seems like only a couple days later and you have zucchini the size of baseball bats! Well, that happened to us this week, so we’ve had an abundance of zucchini to eat and give away. We tried a few new recipes and adapted a few old recipes to bring you some great Paleo, Primal, and Gluten Free recipes for all that squash.

Spiralized Zucchini 

OK, I don’t know how I ever lived without a spiralizer before. This handy little gadget turns all kinds of vegetables into long strings that are similar in width to spaghetti. I bought a $30 professional grade one at Bed Bath & Beyond. The low end models there started at $20 and were all plastic. I thought for $10 more, the professional one had a lot more metal pieces and looked sturdier. I love spiralized zucchini! It is very versatile and easy to eat raw. Below are 3 recipes we made in the last few days as we went a little crazy with the spiralized zucchini. I also spiralized a summer squash that was a bit hard because it sat on the plant too long. This worked great, also – perfect way to use hard summer squash.

Before we get into the recipes, let me give a little advice about how to spiralize squash. If you have huge pieces like we did, then cut them as long as you can to fit your spiralizer. Make sure you have an end piece on the end closest to the handle, or it can dig into the soft part with the seeds and just makes a hole there instead of pushing the vegetable into the blade. If this happens, don’t fret too much, you just have to hand spin it without the handle. The spiralized zucchini noodles still come out great!

Spiralized Zucchini with Paleo Meat Sauce

Recipe inspired by jaysbakingmecrazy.com

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 2-3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 organic red bell pepper, diced
• 2 pounds grass fed ground beef
• 1 29oz can of plain tomato sauce
• 1 14.5 ounce can fire roasted diced tomatoes
• 2 tablespoons coconut aminos
• 1 Tb Italian seasoning
• salt and pepper to taste
• 7-8 cups of raw spiralized zucchini (One extra large zucchini or 3-5 smaller ones)

Directions

1. Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan on medium heat. Add the crushed garlic and saute for a minute to release the flavor. Make sure not to brown or burn the garlic.
2. Add the bell pepper and saute until softened.
3. Add the ground beef and cook until brown. Break up any large chunks.
4. I had quite a lot of oil in my browned meat, so I removed some. To remove or not is your preference. Leave some for flavor.
5. Add in the tomatoes, tomato sauce, coconut aminos, and spices. Stir well and cook for 20 minutes for the flavors to mix.
6. Serve over spiralized squash. I like my spiralized zucchini raw, but if you want it warm, quickly rinse it in hot water. It gets mushy if you overcook it and makes for poor consistency as spaghetti.

Shrimp Scampi Over Spiralized Squash

Ingredients

• 1 pound large raw wild caught shrimp, shelled & deveined
• 2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 3 Tbsp grass-fed butter
• 3-4 garlic cloves, crushed
• 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1/2 cup white cooking wine
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley
• Freshly ground black pepper to taste
• 1 Tbsp lemon juice
• 7-8 cups of spiralized zucchini (One very large zucchini or 3-5 smaller ones)

Directions

1. Heat a saute pan. Add the butter and olive oil. When the butter melts, add the garlic and red pepper flakes. Saute for just a minute to soften and release flavors – don’t let it burn!
2. Add the shrimp and wine. Arrange the shrimp in a single layer and cook 3-4 minutes on each side – until they’re good and pink all the way through. The heat should be high enough so the sauce is bubbling, but not burning.
3. Once cooked and the wine reduced a bit, remove from heat and add the lemon juice, parsley and black pepper. Toss to combine all flavors.
4. Serve over raw or slightly cooked zucchini noodles. Enjoy!

Spiralized Zucchini Greek Salad

Ingredients

• 2 Tbs  extra virgin olive oil
• 2 Tbs organic lemon juice
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp black pepper
• 1/4 tsp oregano
• 1/4 tsp crushed garlic
• 1/8 tsp dry mustard
• 2-3 Tbs red onion, diced small
• 2-3 zucchini spiralized, about 4 cups
• 1/2 large organic tomato, diced
• 1/2 organic cucumber, diced
• 15 kalamata olives, halved
• 2 oz feta cheese, cubed or crumbled
• 2 Tbs chopped organic raw pecans

Directions

1. Whisk the first seven ingredients together for the dressing. Add the onion and set aside for the flavors to combine.
2. Spiralize, chop and combine all other ingredients.
3. Pour the dressing over the veggies and cheese and enjoy!

Paleo French Meat Pie Stuffed Zucchini

My Mémère used to make the best French meat pies. That tradition has been passed to my aunt, and this year I made a few. I’ve altered the recipe a bit to include sweet potatoes instead of regular white potatoes and added celery for the stuffing. I also only used grass-fed ground beef instead of a combination of ground pork and beef. The rest of the recipe is all Mémère’s. Hope you like it as much as we did!

Stuffing Ingredients

• 2 lbs grass-fed ground beef
• 1/2 large onion, diced
• 2 Tbs grass-fed butter
• 2 medium organic sweet potatoes
• 1 tsp Bells Poultry Seasoning
• 1 tsp salt
• pepper to taste

Directions

1. Peel, boil and mash the sweet potatoes. Don’t add anything to the potatoes. Set aside
2. Heat a large skillet to medium high heat. Melt the butter and saute the onion and celery until the onion is translucent.
3. Add hamburger and cook until meat is no longer pink, stirring often to break up the large chunks. Add a little water if it starts to get dry.
4. Add 1/2 the mashed sweet potatoes. Check the consistency. You want just enough to hold it together. Add more if needed. You may not use all of it.
5. Add the cloves, salt and pepper, and poultry seasoning. This part is really to taste, so feel free to change the measurements.
6. Grab your zucchini. Slice in half the long way and scoop out the seeds. I used one XL zucchini because that is what I had. Place on a parchment lined baking sheet. You may have to slice a bit off the bottom to get it to sit flat on the tray.
7. Spoon the stuffing into the zucchini, overflowing it.
8. Cover with foil and cook at 350° until the zucchini is tender, but not mushy. My XL zucchini took close to 1 hour, but smaller ones should be checked after 1/2 hour or so. Remove from oven, slice and serve.

Paleo Zucchini Bread

recipe from theroastedroot.net

Can’t do a zucchini recipe post without a good zucchini bread.  I like chocolate chips in my zucchini bread, so I added it to the recipe. This recipe is great with a cup of coffee for breakfast or dessert.

Ingredients

• 3 eggs lightly beaten
• 1/3 cup pure maple syrup
• ¼ cup full fat canned coconut milk or almond milk
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 1-1/2 cups grated zucchini 1 medium zucchini squash
• 1 cup almond flour
• 1 cup tapioca flour
• 1/4 cup coconut flour
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1 Tbs ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 1/4 cup Enjoy Life Chocolate chips, optional

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375° and use coconut oil to lightly oil a 9″ x 5″ loaf pan.
2. Grab a medium mixing bowl and whisk together the first five ingredients until well-combined. Add in the grated zucchini and stir until well combined.
3. In a separate mixing bowl, stir together the remaining ingredients (except the chocolate chips), the dry ingredients.
4. Pour the flour mixture into the bowl with the wet ingredients and stir to combine. Add chocolate chips, and gently stir. Allow it to sit for 5 to 10 minutes.
5. Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Place on the center rack of the preheated oven. Bake for 35 to 45 minutes, until loaf tests clean in the center.
6. Remove the loaf from the oven and cool for at least 20 minutes. Turn the bread out onto a cutting board and enjoy with butter and honey.