Crispy Zucchini Bites

07 Aug Crispy Zucchini Bites

If you’re into healthy eating, clean eating or a foodie, you’ve likely heard of or have had zucchini noodles or ‘zoodles’ a few hundred times.

If this is your first time hearing about zoodles, welcome to a whole new grain-free way of enjoying the good ‘ol noodle in a fresh, new and  nutritionally charged way.  All you need is a zucchini or two, a vegetable spiralizer or you can you peel a zucchini length-wise using a vegetable peeler to form long thin strips, then stack them and cut the thin slices length-wise into narrow noodle shapes.

I love using zoodles in place of noodles in dishes like spaghetti, pad thai, alongside muscles with a delicious sauce, but this is the first time I’ve baked them to come up with crispy little zucchini bites. When making these bites for the first time, I had other plans of using the zucchini as a boat but my imagination was diverted into thinking these little wee bites of heaven would hold a topping of roasted tomatoes and shrimp. But once they were baked, I realized they’d be best served as an appetizer or along side a main dish -they weren’t quite crispy enough to use as a base to hold up other ingredients.

Whether you use them as an app or a side veggie dish, I think you’ll find the flavours and texture are little bites of fresh Italian heaven.

What you need

1 large or 2 medium zucchini made into noodles
1/8 c avocado oil
2 cloves garlic, minced (or 1 tsp garlic powder)
2 green onions, finely sliced
1/2 c grated cheese (hard goat or parmesan work well) or nutritional yeast as a cheese replacement
Himalayan salt to taste

Cashew Cream

1/2 c raw unsalted cashews
1/2 c filtered water
1/8 c freshly squeezed lemon juice
Himalayan salt to taste

What you do

• Preheat oven to 350°F
• Make zucchini noodles with a spiral slicer or by peeling, then slicing zucchini into noodle shapes
• Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.  Form 12 or so little bundles of  zucchini noodles on the prepared cookie sheet
• Drizzle each nest with approximately 1/4 tsp of avocado oil and a pinch of grated garlic (or sprinkle garlic powder) and salt over all the nests
• Place the cookie sheet in the oven and bake at 350°F for 20 minutes
• Add grated cheese, if using, then broil for an additional 5-10 minutes, or until the top of the zucchini has browned
• If using nutritional yeast instead of cheese, sprinkle it on after the bites have been removed from the oven
• Remove the pan from the oven and serve with a scoop of cashew sour cream and sliced green onion on top
• Enjoy!

For the cashew cream

• Soak cashews for at least 4 hours in water, or overnight
• Blend soaking water, cashews, lemon juice and salt until you achieve a sour cream consistency