Courgette Fritatta
Courgettes and eggs are perfect partners and our
favourite summer omelette is courgette; it is particularly useful when
the courgettes are just starting and only a few are ready at a time.
Slice and lightly fry the courgettes in butter until just beginning to
brown at the edges, beat the eggs with chopped thyme and parsley and
make your omelette.
For a more substantial dish, quite enough
for a main meal served with a salad, make a frittata.
Serves 2 for a main meal, 4 for lunch.
Time taken 20 minutes
500-600g
courgettes
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
3 large eggs
2 tablespoons chopped dill and mint
100g grated cheese of your choice
plenty of ground black pepper
Trim and grate the courgettes and put into a large colander. Sprinkle
over the salt and leave on a draining board for the watery juices to run
out for 10 to 15 minutes.
Heat the oil in a really large frying pan, add the onion and cook to
soften, not brown. Lightly beat the eggs in a large bowl and add the
chopped dill and mint, roughly equal quantities but not more mint than
dill; grind in the pepper. Add the grated courgettes and the grated
cheese to the egg mixture and mix well.
Have the frying pan over a medium heat, too hot and the frittata will
burn before it cooks, and pour in the egg mixture. Shake to settle it
all down and leave to cook until it is set and there are just a few
runny bits on top.
Now comes the tricky bit: if you have a matching frying pan you can, in
theory, turn the frittata into the second pan by tightly holding the
second pan upside down over the first and inverting both together,
allowing the frittata to flop, intact, from pan one to two. If you don’t
have a second pan you can use a large plate instead and then, when you
have the frittata upside down on the plate, slide it back into the
original pan. My frying pan is very heavy and my wrists are not strong
enough to turn it successfully so I usually have to cheat. I carefully
cut out sections of the frittata and turn them on to a plate, then I
slightly re-oil the frying pan, scraping away any stuck bits and slide
the sections of frittata back to reassemble the circle before cooking
for a few more minutes to brown the other side and weld the joins.
A garnish of calendula petals, shredded courgette flower and shredded
chard hides any faults (see picture) and the taste is just as good.