Hello and welcome (back) to the Planet Forward blog and to another entry in my virtual organic gardening journal on a beautiful summer Friday here in the Greater Toronto Area (you can read my previous post here). My entry today is all about the edible flowers that are growing in abundance in my garden and I’m not talking about pansies – I’m talking about but zucchini blossoms.

This year my zucchini plants are in full flower bloom but I’ve only picked six actual (small) zucchinis. In case you are not aware, there are two kinds of flowers that grow on a zucchini plant. There is the male flower which doesn’t grow into a zucchini and can be identified by the thin stem they are on. Then there is the female flower that it is on a thicker stem and will become a zucchini. These flowers are a delicacy that you can only get for a brief time so it is quite a unique situation I’m in here that I’m hoping for more zucchini and less flowers. Every day I’m picking anywhere between sixteen and eighteen blooms, and I’m barely keeping up with them. Most years I’m happy to harvest three a day. I used to be satisfied with having compiled enough for a side dish after collecting them for an entire week. Now, I have enough for a meal everyday and I’ve had to get inventive to keep it interesting.

I’ve scoured the internet for recipes and started soliciting advice from anyone who had ever even seen a zucchini flower. I’ve learned that the possibilities of what you can do with them are endless – you can make fritters with them or an Italian frittata. However I think they are best done in a light tempura style batter and I’ve definitely perfected it this season and shared my yield with family and friends. I only wish the actual zucchini would start to grow. The plants are large and robust looking however I’ve harvested only six zucchini which isn’t many for this time of the year. I’m not sure why but half of the zucchini’s I’ve picked are misshapen too. Instead of straight zucchini mine are “U” shaped. I’ve watered using organic Miracle-Gro feed, and can’t think of anything else to help increase zucchini production—pep talks haven’t worked either.

Every day I hold onto hope that all these flowers will soon give way to a zucchini boom but I’m not confident at this point. I shouldn’t be complaining – last year I had few flowers and even fewer zucchini (although that was partially due to the Sicilian zucchini plant that took over my garden). For those you have never grown their own zucchini, you can buy zucchini flowers at Farmer’s markets and even local grocery stores sometimes. If you haven’t ever tried them you should. For those that grow zucchini, have you ever experienced an influx of flowers one season? Did the zucchini evenutally come in? Please share your experience because I’m in new zucchini territory.

I’ve included my very favourite zucchini/zucchini blossom recipe beneath – I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups flour
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp salt2 tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp garlic
• water (enough to make a thin pancake-like batter)
• heated oil (for frying)
• approximately 24 zucchini flowers or 2 small zucchini cut into quarter inch pieces with the skin on.

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients in a bowl except water.
2. While whisking, gradually add water to the mixture until it forms a batter that is a little thinner than pancake batter consistency.
3. Dredge raw zucchini or zucchini flowers in the batter and drop into hot oil to fry.

As always happy (organic) gardening and please remember to support your local (organic) farmers.