Tessa's Recipe Rundown
Taste: How could something doused with marinara and sprinkled with cheese not taste absolutely heavenly?
Texture: While oven “frying” the zucchini doesn’t produce the crispiest results, the texture is still surprisingly crave-able.
Ease: Much easier than chicken parmesan or lasagna.
Appearance: Any food that has a small, geometrically perfect shape is always going to be pretty.
Pros: This is a perfect recipe for sneaking in some vegetables to your life and can easily be adapted to whatever squash or vegetable that’s in season.
Cons: The recipe involves a 2-step oven process, nothing difficult though.
Would I make this again? Yes, but probably with a different squash as the seasons change.
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Lately I’ve been inspired to cut down on my meat intake and increase my vegetable intake. Doing so improves my health, my wallet’s health (meat can get expensive), and the planet’s health. What do I have to lose? I’ll admit that I grew up consuming some type of meat or poultry daily, so it is a bit of a challenge for me to alter my diet like this. I’ve never been the type of person who can survive off salads alone – I prefer something warm and fulfilling. This is where my recipe for zucchini parmesan comes in. Its hot and bubbling, oozing with cheese, and full of the last of summer’s mild tasting zucchini. I ate this for dinner with a side salad and a hunk of crusty bread and completely forgot I had skipped eating meat that day.
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Ingredients
- 3 large zucchini, sliced into 1/3-inch coins
- 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/2 cup parmesan cheese, grated and divided in half
- 1/4 cup Italian bread crumbs
- salt & freshly ground pepper to taste
- 1 cup marinara sauce, homemade or bottled
- 1/2 cup mozzarella cheese, grated
Instructions
- 1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Coat a large baking sheet with non-stick cooking spray.
- 2. Blot zucchini coins with paper towels to remove excess moisture. Place zucchini in a medium bowl and drizzle with olive oil, turning to coat each piece. In a separate bowl, combine half the parmesan, bread crumbs, salt, and pepper.
- 2. Dip each zucchini coin into the parmesan mixture, turning to coat and pressing the breading slightly to ensure it sticks. Place breaded zucchini coins in one even layer on prepared baking sheet. Bake for 25 minutes or until browned and crisp.
- 3. Reduce the oven temperature to 400 degrees F. Coat the bottom of a small baking dish with marinara sauce. Layer one third of the crisp zucchini coins over marinara, overlapping if necessary. Sprinkle zucchini layer with mozzarella and the remaining parmesan. Repeat the layers 3 times (or until the zucchini is gone, depending on the size of your baking dish) ending with a sprinkling of cheese.
- 4. Bake for 10-15 minutes or until the cheese is melted and the sauce is bubbling. Cool for 5 minutes before serving.
I made this today and it turned out pretty well…and my husband liked it a lot! I wish they would have turned out just a bit more crispy but perhaps I needed to get more moisture out of the zucchini…putting salt on them is a great idea (per above note) for doing this! Thanks for sharing the recipe…would make it again! 🙂
P.S. 25 minutes is not too long…per earlier notes! I even went with a couple of minutes beyond that…maybe that person sliced their zucchini way too thin!
This was great! TIP: I let the zucchini coins sit with a bit of salt on them for 30 min to “leech” the moisture out of them prior to breading them.
I make a recipe similar to this, but first par boil the zuchinni til tender/crisp….on the less done side. Then saute onion, mushroom and garlic til tender, combine marinara and cheese with zuchinni. Omit EVOO! bake at 350 for 30-45 mins til hot!
I love zucchini. I am going to try this it sounds great and looks very good.
I'm not sure whether coating the zucchini in bread is a stellar move, as far as health goes; it uses a lot of oil and no-so-great bread. I'd like to try this recipe, but I'd cook the zucchini in a skillet while waiting for the oven to heat up, then sprinkle some bread crumbs (ala macaroni and cheese style) over the top to give it a crunch, or just leave them out all together.
25 mins is way to long!!!!!!! My shit was crispy as hell. My oven was a' smokin. I came in from a cigarette and found out I wasn't the only one smokin… They were only in there for 10 mins
Really? This is a recipe trailer trash. Is that really necessary?
Um. People who live in trailers are not all trash. Way to try to state your point and manage to offend an entire group of hard-working, kind people at the same time. Very mature.
I made this tonight and while my kids wouldn't even try it (previous bad food experience with zucchini) it tasted great. A few comments though; important to note that the zucchini reduces in the oven so they should be sliced a little thicker than you'd think, to hold up to the baking & fresh mozzarella tasted amazing vs. grated …just in the way it melted (it was salted too). Great flavors, thank you for posting this
Looks wonderful. I'm going to try this as soon as I can get to the store to get some zucchini, love zucchini!
Oh my gosh, just made this for dinner, so amazing! I will for sure have to double it next time, so much goodness! Thanks again for the great recipe!
Yum, this sounds so tasty! Going to try it out tonight! Thanks for the fab recipe!
Looks very yummy. I'm a cheese fanatic so I'll have to put extra on mine when I make this recipe 🙂
This was delicious! I made it tonight, and it got rave reviews from my husband (and me, too). Really delicious. Thanks for the recipe. I didn't “drain” the zucchini, and I was pleased with the texture. Thanks for the recipe!!