Stuffed Zucchini Boats
An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott
Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 50 minutes
Serves: 2-4 people with a side dish
- 4x 170g/6oz zucchinis or courgettes
- 2 teaspoons oil
- 1 white or brown onion, peeled and diced
- 200g/7ozs pork and fennel sausage, cases removed, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic, peeled and diced
- 2 cups/500ml/1pint marinara or red pasta sauce, divided
- 2 teaspoons Italian herb mix
- 3 tablespoons water
- 50g/1.7ozs parmesan cheese, finely grated
- 150g/5ozs mozzarella, grated
Step 1 - Cut the zucchinis in half lengthways and trim the tops off. Scoop out the centre with a teaspoon or a zucchini corer - you want to dig out enough to fit in a lot of the flavoursome filling but don't go all the way to the edge, leave a border (as shown). Fit them snugly into a baking dish. Finely chop up the zucchini centres.
Step 2 -Preheat oven to 180C/350F fan forced. Add oil to a saucepan and sauté the onion on medium heat for 3-4 minutes or until soft and fragrant. Add the sausage meat and brown until almost completely cooked making sure to break it up with a wooden spoon. Add the garlic and saute for 1 minute. Then add 1.5 cups pasta sauce, chopped zucchini centres and Italian herb mix and sauté for 10 minutes. Take off the heat. Spoon this mixture into the zucchini and then spoon the extra pasta sauce on top of this. Add 3 tablespoons of water to the dish and cover with foil and bake for 25 minutes. Remove the foil and sprinkle the parmesan cheese and then the mozzarella on top and bake for another 10 minutes or until melted and starting to brown.