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.This post may contain affiliate links. Read our disclosure policy.
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.
Layered Zucchini Parmesan
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.
Second time making this and it’s delicious. Cut bake on the Parmesan cheese for less salt and used vegan mozzarella cheese.
I made a vegan version with no cheese. I seasoned the breadcrumbs with Italian seasoning and put them on top too! So good!
You neglected to mention what to do with the remaining marinara. I’m assuming you layer it with the mozzarella?
Made this for dinner tonight. I did use the TrishPia tip: 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.OMG Delicious!
Tessa, my family has made a similar but easier version of this recipe for years. My husband and I will eat this for dinner with a salad. Layer the zucchini, sliced onion, moz. Cheese and favorite sauce. Bake in oven at 350 for about one hour or until zucchini become translucent. Delicious and healthy.
I blitzed through this thing and missed a key concept…make sure the coins are 1/3 of an inch thick! I thought mine were thick but I’d say they were probably less than a quarter of an inch thick and those babies shrink right up and burn! Most of mine made it okay, but I just came to say that you should err on the side of having them too thick!
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Followed the recipe, but used egg to coat before the breadcrumbs and did the final bake in muffin tons for easier proportion! Very tasty!
Love the idea of baking in muffin tins, thanks for the tip!
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Hello,
I have been making a similar dish, but, breaded with flour, eggwash, then italian breadcrumbs for years, with the parmesan, and mozzarella. It absolutely destroys the eggplant, and since the sauce is homemade, from my own tomatoes, it came out a bit tart, even after sugar was added to reduce acidity. For some reason, the zucchini tasted outstanding with the sauce, and since there was an eggwash, it nearly tasted as if there is meat in the dish. I deep fry the medallions twice, to ensure they are crispy after they were taken out, as the medallions became moist on the breading after frying once for 10 minutes. I refryed them in peanut oil, and then layered exactly as described. It was the best dish I have ever made or eaten. UNBELIEVABLE!! A little red wine in the sauce makes it all way better. try it out if you make homemade sauce! It’s outstanding!
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I made this tonight, but cooked up the breaded zucchini in a pan with some olive oil. I had some diced tomatoes with onion left over from the turkey meatloaf I made a couple days ago and subbed that for the marinara. It was delicious!