Thursday, June 23, 2011

Splendid Summer Squash


On the Grill

Use any kind of summer squash for this delicious vegetable dish; patty pan, green zucchini or yellow crookneck work equally well. Remove the ends and slice them longitudinally into one-fourth inch slices. The patty pan squashes make a round slice and it’s easy to put a slice of tomato on top of them and grill the tomato and the squash together.

Make a mixture of 1 part olive oil and 1 part melted butter with salt, black pepper and chili powder in fairly generous amounts.
Lay the slices on a hot barbeque grill and brush with the olive oil mixture. Grill on medium heat for 7 – 10 minutes and turn over for at least another 5 minutes. How much time grilling takes depends on the temperature of the grill.
These can be eaten straight off the grill or can be drizzled with a sauce made of mayonnaise, creole mustard, and honey mustard. Any hot mustard mixed with mayonnaise will make a delectable sauce for these vegetables.
BETTER YET
Phase 2 of this grilling project is to layer the grilled squash in a 9 x 13 glass baking dish with bread crumbs and grated Parmesan. Repeat the layers about 3 times, and then top the whole casserole with grated mozzarella. Put into a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes to melt the cheeses together. Cut into squares and top with warm spaghetti sauce and just a sprinkle of Parmesan. The smokey flavor and the texture of the grilled vegetables together with the cheeses creates a main dish that is easily as good as lasagna or eggplant Parmesan, and it is amazingly easy to put together.

The means are the end in the making. Mahatma Gandhi