Zucchini and More Zucchini

Touring the garden of a friend not long ago, I received this priceless gift: a whopping four-pound  zucchini. Go ahead and whistle; it was a beauty.


It wasn't much different in shape and size than my swaddled newborn backup dancer, nine years ago. My instinct was to put the zucchini to my shoulder and try to burp it.


I swung into action: I must not waste this precious green squash! I must find ways to consume four pounds of zucchini before it went bad! In a frenzy, I dove into recipes, and we feasted on zucchini for days. You can find all the details below.

But first, you may have heard that a major and seriously damning report on climate change was issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on August 9. Then again, you may NOT have heard about it, because a lot of us were so alarmed by what we read about the scientists' findings--even (or perhaps especially) if we only read the headlines--that we set it aside. It is hard to digest horror on that scale.

Short version: climate change is accelerating faster than previously predicted. It is unequivocally caused by emissions of greenhouse gases, which themselves are caused by human activity. The severe weather events that world has been increasingly experiencing are a consequence of the accelerating climate change.

I was one of those people who found myself looking away. 

When the report came out, I was, and still am, on a long, COVID-cautious road trip with my backup dancers. One of our trip stops was Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia. You may recall that our family has an interest in this period of American history.

Yep, this is us, in 2019

One of our stops in Williamsburg was at the millinery operated from 1774 to 1787 by Margaret Hunter, an unmarried Englishwoman. The shop was cheerful, with extravagant hats and colorful fabrics. 


Well done, Margaret, you plucky entrepreneur, I found myself thinking, until I learned that she owned ten enslaved people. Then I felt kind of sick.

If Margaret ever questioned slavery, she doubtless knew that the life she'd built would fail without her slaves. Half of the population of Williamsburg at that time was enslaved people, so she'd probably have concluded that there was no point in choosing to be a martyr, and so she carried on. But that doesn't make it remotely right.

Then I thought about all of us in 2021, scrolling past the IPCC findings and carrying on despite knowing that actions we take every day are destroying the natural world and making the planet increasingly unlivable.

That's wrong in itself, but what's worse is that climate change particularly affects disadvantaged people - those who can't afford to protect themselves from its effects by moving or insuring their property, for example, and those with a limited range of job opportunities for reasons outside their control. Since long-ago slavery gave white people economic, educational, housing, and other advantages over Black people that persist today, the tragedy of climate change compounds the tragedy of slavery.

While climate injustice is gravely disturbing, and the IPCC's new findings are gutting, we already know many ways to address climate change. This is true at the policy level (please vote for candidates who support policy changes to reduce greenhouse gas emissions), but it's also true at an individual level. 

Basing your diet on plant rather than animal products is one of those things that we can do as individuals to address climate change.

And so we circle back to the gargantuan zucchini. There are a great many delicious vegetarian and vegan things to make with zucchini! You could grate some zucchini, squeeze the moisture out with a dishtowel, and then sauté it lightly in butter or oil. Then add in some beaten eggs, and season with salt and pepper, for a riff on scrambled eggs. I topped mine with dabs of cream cheese.


And you could make "Spaghetti With Zucchini And Mint" (NYT Cooking; subscription required), which sort of put me in mind of spaghetti carbonara, so I topped it with smoked paprika. If cream cheese was an inspired topping for zucchini scrambled eggs, well, smoked paprika on the pasta was not quite so inspired. But it was plenty good anyway; just leave that off.


At this point you are making a dent in your giant zucchini.


Then you could make "Summer Squash Fritters With Garlic Dipping Sauce" (NYT Cooking again). You could make it with any combination of types of squash, so feel free to use just zucchini. Again, wring out the shredded squash before proceeding. I also recommend just putting enough oil in the pan to coat the bottom, though it will take longer for the fritters to finish. The sauce is great.


Fritters served with a cherry tomato, cucumber, and mozzarella salad

And you could make zucchini bread, using this recipe from a dear friend:




You might still have some zucchini left, though!


So buckle down and make some of the zucchini recipes I have profiled in the past: 

As stated by Axios' Andrew Freedman, the damage from climate change "doesn't have to keep getting worse at this pace." I implore you not to look away from the problem because you are overwhelmed or because others' inaction gives you cover (as Jonathan Freedland noted in The Guardian, the practical effect is that you might as well be a climate science denier). Instead, take simple actions within your power to fight it, like saving meat for special occasions, and observing Vegan Vednesdays. There's an offhand list of other simple actions at the end of one of my February blog posts, if you're interested. I'll bet you can think of plenty more, too.

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