Courgette Recipes

Got a glut of courgettes on your hands, or simply fancy a versatile, mild-flavoured veg for tonight's dinner? You're in the right place. Known as zucchini in the US, courgettes are one of the most forgiving vegetables to cook with: their soft texture and mild flavour mean they soak up whatever herbs, spices or sauces you pair them with. Low in calories, one of your five-a-day and a good of fibre and vitamin C, they're a brilliant year-round staple for vegetarian and vegan cooking, but they really come into their own from June to October, when home-grown courgettes can take over a kitchen overnight.

Courgettes are the backbone of dishes like ratatouille, lasagne, gratins, quiches, frittatas, fritters, soups, curries and stir-fries, and they work just as well in cakes, muffins and waffles, where their moisture keeps bakes wonderfully soft. Whether you're trying to use up a glut from the garden or just need a quick, healthy midweek meal, there's a courgette recipe here for it.

How to cook courgettes

Courgettes are wonderfully versatile because they can be eaten raw or cooked. Sliced thinly or spiralised, they make a lovely base for a raw salad with a simple lemon and olive oil dressing. Cooked, they can be grilled, roasted, sautéed, stewed, stuffed, grated into bakes, or dipped in batter and fried. Courgette flowers, if you can get hold of them at a farmers' market or you grow your own, make a beautiful, delicate fritter. Because courgettes hold a lot of water, grating or slicing them and salting briefly before cooking helps draw out excess moisture, particularly useful for fritters, cakes and gratins where a soggy result is the main pitfall. For a warming way to use them up, try this courgette soup recipe with lemon, mint, basil and dill.

What pairs well with courgettes?

Courgettes pair beautifully with herbs such as basil, rosemary, thyme, tarragon, sage, parsley, oregano, dill and mint. They also sit well alongside other summer produce, including aubergines, peppers and tomatoes, in pasta, rice, polenta or grain-based dishes. For an Asian-inspired twist, try them with ginger, tofu, curry paste or coconut milk, as in this courgette and tofu curry. For something fresher, the marinated courgette salad with capers and olives makes the most of raw courgette ribbons, while the quinoa and courgette gratin turns them into a comforting bake.

What to do with a courgette glut

If you grow your own, you'll know how quickly courgette plants can get out of hand. The good news is that courgettes freeze well once cooked (try grating and freezing in portions for soups, bakes and fritters later in the year), and they're forgiving enough to swap into almost any of the recipes above in larger quantities. Baking is one of the best glut solutions, since courgettes' moisture works in your favour: the chocolate courgette cake, courgette, basil, lime and pistachio cake and courgette muffins with coconut and lime are three of the easiest ways to use up several courgettes at once without anyone noticing they're eating their vegetables.

Growing your own courgettes

Growing your own courgettes is so easy — in fact that's usually the problem. Courgette plants are prolific, so make sure you give them plenty of space, and keep an eye out so you can pick them while they're still small and tender; left too long, they turn into marrows. Traditional courgettes come in deep green, but you can also find yellow and striped varieties, which add a lovely pop of colour to a plate. See the RHS guide to growing courgettes for full growing instructions.

UK season: June to October. Nutritional content: Low in calories and fat. Good source of fibre, vitamin C, potassium and antioxidants.