Give Thanks to Zucchini on August 8th!

When researching upcoming holidays, national days and other summer celebrations in search of inspiration, I came across the little known and eye-catchingly strange “National Sneak Some Zucchini Onto Your Neighbor's Porch Day,” taking place on August 8th. Invented by eccentric actor Thomas Roy, the day purportedly exists due to the zucchini plant’s tendency to produce, produce, produce far more fruits than can be consumed by a typical home grower. Sneaking a basket of stripey green squash onto your neighbor’s porch helps take care of your excess produce, promoting communal food sharing and seasonal cooking along the way!

In this spirit of season-appropriate cooking, I would like to share my favorite zucchini-centric recipe: Zucchini Taglierini! For other recipes featuring zucchini (or courgette in French), check out The Year of Miracles, shortlisted for the 2023 Andre Simon Best Cookbook Award!

 

Zucchini Taglierini

Ingredients

Pasta of choice (the original recipe calls for handmade taglierini, I usually use penne rigate)

8 oz small green or golden zucchini

1 lemon

6 tablespoons virgin olive oil

5 tablespoons pine nuts (chopped walnuts are a decent substitute)

2 large shallots, thinly sliced

4 teaspoons capers, rinsed

2-3 sun-dried tomatoes, cut into strips

Salt and pepper

1. Bring a pot of water to boil.

2. Slice the zucchini diagonally into ⅛-¼ inch thick slices. Line up the slices and cut them into narrow matchsticks. Each one will be tipped with green or gold.

3. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a small pan and add the nuts. Cook them until they begin to color, then add the shallots. Cook the two together on medium-low heat until the shallots are soft and the pine nuts are browned. Transfer them to a wide bowl and add the rest of the oil, capers, and sun-dried tomatoes. Season with salt, freshly ground black pepper, and about ½ teaspoon of lemon juice (to taste).

4. Add salt to the boiling water, drop in the zucchini matchsticks, and cook for 1 minute. Scoop out the zucchini, shake off the water, and add it to the bowl with the other ingredients.

5. Add the pasta to the boiling water and cook to preference. Add the cooked pasta to the bowl with the rest of the ingredients. Toss the pasta and other ingredients together and serve.

snowy selections to keep heat at bay

 

The shoe-melting hot concrete and blistering air of Georgia summer have me dreaming of snow. If you too like arctic escapes in your literature, these are the titles for you. 

 

"The Writing Retreat" by Julia Bartz

A bone-chilling writer's nightmare, set in snow-capped rural New York. A young novelist is accepted to a horror writers’ retreat, hosted by her favorite author in a remote gothic castle where demonic possession potentially once took place. But when things seem too good to be true, they usually are. Our heroine’s ex-best-friend, now a sworn enemy, is in attendance. The stakes rise as the writers learn they have a month to write an entirely new novel, with the winner getting a cushy publication deal. The competition is cutthroat. At first, metaphorically. Later, literally. The surrounding snow blocks easy escape when things get bloody.  Click To Buy Here

 

 "Migrations" by Charlotte McConaghy

 If you’re ever feeling too happy, no worries; this book will fix that. Its draw is the double-whammy of heartbreak and climate change. The protagonist runs from past failures in love and towards the arctic to study the last-ever migration of terns. She hates fishermen, but hitches a ride on a fishing boat. Tensions are taut on this boat as icebergs and oceanic snowstorms carve away what little sanity the crew clings on to. Mutiny brews. The plot veers towards the melodramatic, but that makes sense: our heroine is hapless, and her beloved birds are dying (as is most life on Earth). Get ready to feel snow in your hair and the salty sting of the ocean (or maybe your tears) with this one.  Click To Buy Here

 

"The True Deceiver" by Tove Jansson

Our chilly main character is Katri Kling, incredibly intelligent and ferociously antisocial. She lives in a snowy Scandinavian village, caring for no one but her brother and dog. Further away lives Anna Aemelin, a reclusive children’s book illustrator in a gorgeous house coveted by Katri. Braving snowstorms on foot, Katri treks with weekly supplies to Anna’s house, taking over the old courier’s route as she tries to worm into Anna’s life and take over the house. The author, Tove Jansson, is most famous for her children’s books about the Moomins, so the psychological twistiness of this one is deliciously different from the usual. It’s still somehow cozy: the glow of lamps on snow, a hearth warming to keep cold at bay. Click To Buy Here

 

“Moon of the Crusted Snow” by Waubgeshig Rice

An Anishinaabe First Nations community prepares for the winter ahead. A sudden blackout severs telephones, electricity, all connections to the wider world. Community leaders try to curb the peoples’ panic as supplies dwindle. Interlopers from the South bring news of the apocalypse striking cities beyond the reservation. Snow is a deadly obstacle in this novel, stalling trucks and killing youngsters, sliding under even the heaviest coats of the fearful and starving. But, the warmth of community keeps the worst frost at bay.  Click To Buy Here