Ready for zucchini season?

This recipe, from Lucero Olive Oil, adds zucchini to a thicker pesto-like recipe, that’s used as a spread instead of a sauce.

You can use it on crackers, crostini, grilled eggplant rounds, pizza dough and of course, toast.

You can even add it to a savory oatmeal breakfast, mixed into the oatmeal and topped with a fried egg.

The following recipe is made with olive oil. Here’s a version made with butter and different seasonings, from Dishing Up The Dirt.
 
 
RECIPE: ZUCCHINI BUTTER

Ingredients For About 2 Cups

 
Preparation

1. COARSELY GRATE the zucchini. Let it drain in a colander for 3 to 4 minute,s or until ready to begin cooking. To hasten cooking time, squeeze the water out of the zucchini by wringing it in a clean cloth towel or paper towels.

2. HEAT the olive oil in a deep skillet. Sauté the shallots or garlic briefly. Add the zucchini and toss.

3. COOK and stir over medium to medium-high heat until the zucchini reaches a spreadable consistency, about 15 minutes.

If you scorch the bottom, turn the flame down—and scrape those delicious bits into the butter for added flavor. You can splash in a little water to help deglaze the pan. The zucchini will hold its bright green color and slowly caramelize into a vegetable jam.

4. SPREAD on toast (crostini!), or serve as a side dish/condiment Keep in a tightly-lidded jar in the fridge.
 
 
National Zucchini Day is August 8th.

[1] Spread zucchini butter on toast or crostini (photo #1, courtesy Dishing Up The Dirt).

[2] A close-up (photo courtesy Lucero Olive Oil).

[3] Zucchini on the vine (photo courtesy Burpee).

[1] Peach lemonade: lemonade and peach purée with a fresh peach garnish (photo courtesy Flavor & The Menu).

[2] Mulled lemonade, with cinnamon, cloves, fresh ginger, orange peel and pink peppercorns. Here’s the recipe from A Spicy Perspective.

[3] Blueberry lemonade, with blueberry purée and fresh blueberries. Tip: Freeze the blueberries first, and they’ll keep the drink colder, longer. Here’s the recipe from The Blueberry Council.

[4] Cucumber lemonade. Here’s the recipe, from Kimpton Hotels.

[5] Sparkling melon lemonade. Here’s the recipe from Zulka Sugar.

Love lemonade?

Here are some tips from Flavor & The Menu, a website that scouts restaurants nationwide for new ideas (with some of our own ideas for good measure).

Summer is lemonade season. You can create flavored by perusing these tips and adding a second flavor to your lemonade.

You also can do the same with limeade, which for some reason is rarely on the menu. We don’t know why: It’s just as delicious as lemonade.

August 20th is National Lemonade Day, but we didn’t want to wait until then to share these recipe ideas.

Start with fresh-squeezed lemonade. O.K., you can use frozen, but if you want to make lemonade from scratch, here’s how.
 
 
ADD FRUIT

You can do it by infusion, or by mixing purées (much faster).

 
ADD FIZZ

Sparkling water and soft drinks can create unique takes on lemonade. Use a little or a lot of:

 
Two ideas from restaurants:

 
ADD HERBS & SPICE

We’ve already mentioned basil lemonade, but there are other sweet herbs, plus spices.

 
Examples:

 
You also can make mulled lemonade. Like mulled wine, the lemonade is heated with spices and peel. But then it’s cooled and ready to refresh. Here’s a recipe from A Spicy Perspective (photo #2).
 
 
MAKE FROZEN LEMONADE

Use fruit purée or syrups to create frozen lemonade. Here’s how to make frozen lemonade.

 
Examples:

 
 
FLAVORED LEMONADE RECIPES

 
LEMONADE COCKTAIL RECIPES

 
 
THE HISTORY OF LEMONADE

[1] A chocolate hamburger, made with pandoro.

[2] Pandoro is ubiquitous during the holiday season, but you can find it year-round. If you can’t, substitute pound cake in this recipe.

[3] There are numerous other uses for pandoro (all photos courtesy Bauli).

May is National Hamburger Month, and Chef Luca Manfè’s Chocolate Pandoro Burger encourages burger lovers to extend their love to dessert.

Chef Luca developed this recipe for Bauli, producers of pandoro and panettone.

The chocolate hamburger, with pastry cream as the mayo and raspberry sauce as ketchup, is enveloped by a pandoro bun.
 
 
RECIPE: CHOCOLATE HAMBURGER

Ingredients For 4 Servings
 
For The Burger

 
For The Bun

 
For The Pastry Cream

 
For The Raspberry Sauce

1. MAKE the chocolate burgers. Place the butter on the counter to soften completely. Melt the chocolate in a water bath.

2. USE a stand mixer to bring the eggs to a volume with the sugar. When the chocolate cools completely, add it to the whipped eggs with the crushed biscotti and butter. Mix all together and put in the fridge for 20-30 minutes or until the mixture is easy to shape.

3. ROLL the cooled mixture like a log, in a piece of parchment paper. You should get two logs, 2 inches log. Place back in the fridge and let cool.

4. MAKE the pastry cream. In a saucepan, combine milk, 1/4 cup sugar, vanilla bean and seeds, and salt. Cook over medium heat until the mixture comes to a simmer.

5. WHISK together in a bowl the egg yolks, cornstarch, and remaining 1/4 cup sugar. Whisking constantly, slowly pour about 1/2 cup of the hot-milk mixture into the egg-yolk mixture, 1/2 cup at a time, until it has been incorporated. Pour mixture back into saucepan, and cook about 2 minutes over medium-high heat, whisking constantly, until it thickens.

6. REMOVE and discard the vanilla bean. Transfer the mixture to the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Add the butter, and beat on medium speed for about 5 minutes until the butter melts and the mixture cools.

7. COVER with plastic wrap, pressing the plastic directly onto the surface of the pastry cream to prevent a skin from forming. Refrigerate until chilled, at least 2 hours (it can be stored for up to 2 days). Just before using, beat on low speed until smooth, or whisk it by hand.

8. MAKE the raspberry sauce. Combine the raspberries, sugar, lemon juice and salt in a small saucepan set over low heat. Cook until the berries release their juices and just start to break down, about 5 minutes.

9. USE a rubber spatula to press the berries through a fine-mesh sieve; discard the solids. Return the strained juice to the saucepan, stir in cornstarch, and cook until mixture comes to a boil. Let cool. Store, refrigerated, in an airtight container, for up to 3 days.

10. CUT the bun slices. Use a 2-1/2″ ring or cookie cutter to cut pandoro circles. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter In a pan melt and toast the slices of Pandoro on both sides. Assemble and serve immediately: bun half, burger, raspberry sauce, pastry cream and bun top.

As we near the end of National Hamburger Month, we report on burger trends.

Forget bacon cheeseburgers, or burgers with lettuce, tomato and onion. They’re old school.
 
 
RESTAURANT TRENDS FOR BURGERS

According to a survey by Flavor & The Menu, here are the hot-growth burger toppings at better restaurants:

 
And for the burger itself:

 
 
THE AUSSIE BURGER

For fun, we looked around and found The Aussie Burger, popular Down Under. It starts with a lamb burger, and adds:

 
Here’s the recipe.

[1] What’s on your burger? Here are the offerings at better restaurants, per Flavor & The Menu).

[2] Here’s what’s happening in Australia (photo courtesy True Aussie Beef & Lamb).

[1] From Allen Brothers, a seafood mixed grill assortment of sea bass fillets, giant shrimp and bacon-wrapped scallops.

[2] Seafood mixed grill (photo courtesy Flavor & The Menu).

[3] The original mixed grill is an assortment of meats, like this carnivore’s delight at The Chop House in Singapore.

We’re going upscale on Memorial Day. No burgers or hot dogs. Not even the more posh chicken or steak.

Instead, we’re piling on the “brain food” with a seafood mixed grill. It matches the environment: a friend’s large, leafy, landscaped backyard atop the New Jersey Palisades, with an incredible view of Manhattan.

A mixed grill is an assortment of grilled meats. Traditionally, it was cooked over charcoal in chop houses.

According to The New York Times:

 
Here are more mixed grills from around the world.

And Americans? Our mixed grill, even though we don’t call it that, consists of burgers, hot dogs and brats, chicken and ribs.

If your palate favors grilled lamb chops and steaks instead…please invite us!
 
 
SEAFOOD MIXED GRILL

We’ve long enjoyed a seafood mixed grill, whether cooked on the stove top or on an outdoor grill. Our ideal assortment consists of:

 
The grilled seafood is so delicious as is that it needs no sauce; just a wedge of lemon (you can grill the wedges).

But if you want one, here’s a simple lemon “vinaigrette” that doesn’t mask the flavors of the seafood.

Recipe: Seafood Vinaigrette

Just whisk the ingredients together several hours in advance or overnight, to allow the garlic to infuse. For 6 servings: