New Meal Monday: Caprese Zucchini Boats

While we've had a garden for years, this has been our first year growing zucchini! We sort of made the descision on a whim.  We had some extra space in our garden, and thought "hey, we like zucchini".  Well here we are, the first full week of August, and we've officially started looking for creative ways to eat zucchini...because we've had a lot of it, and you can't live on zoodles alone!
We landed on the idea of "Zucchini Boats" which are essentially stuffed, baked zucchini.  We were inspired by a flatbread my wife had out at lunch recently and landed on the idea of a "Caprese Zucchini Boat"!  With freshly, picked zucchini and cherry tomatoes, and fresh spinach and mozzarella these were delicious, and a great, light summer meal (or app to share!).  This dish is easy and definitely worth a try while these ingredients are all in season! 

The quantity of the ingredients you'll need will likely vary a bit based on the size of you zucchini and your personal preferences.

What you need:

  • 2 zucchini
  • ~12 cherry tomatoes, halved
  • Pesto
  • Mozzarella Cheese, sliced 1/4-1/2" thick
  • Balsamic Vinegar
  • Spinach
  • salt
  • pepper

How you'll do it:

  1. Pre-heat oven to 400F. 
  2. Spray a baking dish with cooking oil and set aside.
  3. Cut ends off zucchinis, and halve lengthwise.  Scoop the pulp/seeds from the center and discard.  Sprinkle a pinch of salt and a pinch of pepper on each zucchini half.
  4. Coat each zucchini half with pesto, using a brush, make sure pesto and oils are spread across the whole half.
  5. Lay a single coat of spinach on top of the pesto, and sprinkle cherry tomato halves on top and bake for 10 min.
  6. Remove from oven, top with mozzarella slices. Bake an additional 10-15 min. until zucchini is cooked.
  7. Drizzle balsamic on top to taste and enjoy!