Pan-Fried Zucchini Flowers

A traditional appetizer in Italy, fried zucchini flowers are slightly crunchy and mild in flavor. These are the perfect summer treats!

Sometimes I feel like doing a cooking project – to love cooking for cooking. These fried zucchini flowers do the job perfectly. A traditional appetizer in Italy, fried zucchini flowers are slightly crunchy and mild in flavor. They’re not very filling, so it’s easy to make a portion and eat it right away (it’s definitely a treat to enjoy with a friend or loved one).

Tips for cooking with zucchini flowers

When preparing zucchini flower recipes, you should make sure to use male zucchini flowers. Male flowers have a stalk, while female zucchini flowers are attached to the squash itself. You can likely find these flowers at the local farmer’s market or health food store. Our garden is producing more flowers than zucchini right now, so we decided to harvest and roast some in our free time last weekend. If you’re buying the flowers from a farmer’s market, make sure you’re buying zucchini flowers and not flowers from another squash, as zucchini flowers have a milder flavor.

When working with zucchini flowers, you have to be very careful. Wash them thoroughly under running water and hang them to dry (do not wring them out or put them in a salad spinner!). A light coating of egg and flour is enough to make the buds deliciously crunchy and keep the bud intact during the frying process.

We’ve found that vegetable oil works best for this zucchini flower recipe because of its light flavor and fairly high smoke point. “Healthier” oils like coconut oil or olive oil taste too strong to work with this recipe, not to mention it would make frying these zucchini flowers quite expensive. When you start roasting the zucchini flowers, make sure you turn on the fan above your stovetop and open a few windows if possible. As delicious as these fried zucchini flowers are, they’ll poison your kitchen (but it’s worth it once you try them).

These zucchini blossoms should be eaten immediately as they don’t keep well in the fridge. Alex and I love simple flowers, but I bet they would taste amazing dipped in romesco sauce or tzatziki – it’d be like a Mediterranean fusion appetizer!

Looking for more zucchini recipes?

This recipe is…

Vegetarian.