Greek Zucchini Fritters
They ended up looking pretty good
Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
Ingredient Availability: 3/5
Difficulty: 4/5
In an effort to eat more vegetables, sometimes I’ll try things that I typically don’t like. I’m not a big fan of zucchini, so maybe frying them up with some cheese will help. Sure, it may make them less healthy as a whole, but it’s better than no vegetables, right? I got this recipe from the Zaytinya cookbook, which typically has pretty good recipes, so I have high hopes.
Key Ingredients & Omissions:
This recipe asks for two relatively obscure ingredients. One is orange blossom water, which I just omitted entirely, as I don’t really know where I could buy that locally. The other is the Kefalograviera cheese, which I replaced with Manchego cheese as recommended earlier in the cookbook. Other than those two things, I remained true to the recipe.
Tools:
Box grater
Skillet or frying vessel
Cooking Review:
Sauce: 8 minutes
To make the sauce, I chopped up some mint and added it to the greek yogurt along with some water, caper brine, and salt. I whisked it until smooth and set it in the refrigerator.
Prep: 22 minutes
The prep for this recipe included shredding the zucchini and cheese, slicing the scallions, and chopping the parsley and mint.
Mix Zucchini: 7 minutes
Next, I mixed the zucchini, scallions, parsley, mint, oregano, panko, cheese, flour, pepper, and salt until well combined.
Whip and fold in Egg Whites: 10 minutes
It took about 9 minutes to whip the egg whites to firm peaks. Once thick enough, I folded in the egg whites into the Zucchini mixture.
Attempt to cook in Skillet: 4 minutes
After heating the oil in a large skillet, I added the zucchini mixture using a tablespoon measure. I flattened each mound out using the back of a spoon and let it cook for 2 minutes before attempting to flip. This is where I had a big problem. The fritters stuck pretty well to the pan, so I couldn’t flip them without tearing them apart. I think the cheese was the problem, as it usually is pretty sticky when cooked. I decided to deep fry them instead. The 3 that didn’t turn out right just didn’t have any crispy crust.
Deep Frying Fritters: 8 minutes + heating oil (8 minutes)
After heating some oil in a wok, I scooped the fritter mix into the oil and cooked them for about 3 minutes per batch for two batches. Once done cooking, I transferred the fritters to a paper towel line baking sheet..
Analysis:
Despite the initial difficulties with the preferred cooking method, these fritters taste pretty good. The interiors are very smooth, almost creamy, with a nice cheesy, oniony flavor. The exteriors have a very light crisp crunch to them, which contrasts nicely with the soft interior. The sauce is pretty basic, essentially just slightly minty greek yogurt, but it works well with the fritters. The tanginess of the yogurt cuts the creaminess of the fritters nicely. I would definitely give these a pretty high score if they worked for me in the skillet, but I have to deduct points for that failure, as well as for the obscure ingredients. I’m going to give this recipe a 6/10. If you can get it to work out of the skillet, you probably won’t be disappointed at all. However, the fact that you may run into the same problem I had is off-putting.
