Saturday,
July 22, 2006
Zucchini has taken over
the world
The
ANNOTICO Report
Though
it seems impossible to imagine today, 100 years ago zucchini was a brand-new
vegetable. The first recorded mention of a squash from the zucchini family was
a regional Milanese variety in 1901 in an Italian seed pamphlet.
Zucchini
was probably a spontaneously occurring genetic mutation that was recognized by
its grower as having better flavor, color and shape than its parents and so its
seeds were saved and replanted. Today, as much zucchini is harvested around the
world as all other members of the squash family put together.
Zucchini
was brought to the
The
fact that it was described as such is testimony to the cachet of the new
vegetable. As is the fact that later in that same year, the Thanksgiving menu
of the Victor Hugo restaurant, at 623 S. Hill St., gave zucchini prominent
billing alongside ravioli "genoise" and
Imperial Valley Tom Turkey.
However, many of the squashes we now call zucchini really aren't zucchini at
all. It is just another part of the long and tangled history of the squash
family. Squash as we now know it was introduced to Europe by
Squash
is part of the large and widely varied cucurbit family, which includes
cucumbers and most melons. It goes on and gets more complicated, and picking
out the "right" zucchini to avoid disappointment requires knowledge outlined below.
Zucchini
has taken over the world, but
By
Russ Parsons
Times Staff Writer
July 19, 2006
FROM all over the globe they come to
Yet it's safe to say that without us
Today zucchini is so ubiquitous it's like vegetable wallpaper seen everywhere but noticed never. That's
true in this country, where it is so plentiful it has become the butt of jokes,
and even globally, where! one squash expert says there
is probably as much zucchini harvested around the world as all other members of
the squash family put together.
Though it seems impossible to imagine today, 100 years ago zucchini was a
brand-new vegetable. According to Harry S. Paris, the preeminent squash
historian, the first recorded mention of a squash from the zucchini family was
a regional Milanese variety in 1901 in an Italian seed pamphlet.
The records are foggy at the turn
of the century no one seems to have deemed the introduction of a new squash
much worth writing about but the
best evidence shows that zucchini was brought to the United States by Italian
immigrants around World War I.
And despite the fact that the first academic reference to zucchini in this
country didn't come until 1937, in Southern California it was well-known much
earlier than that, thanks to a local seed supplier and a couple of downtown Los
Angeles restaurants.
Throughout the 1920s,! according
to The Times archives,
Paris, who got his start helping his dad grow melons in his backyard in
Brooklyn, is now a senior research scientist at Newe Ya'ar Research Center in
Historic seed catalog
SQUASH maven Amy Goldman, while researching "The Compleat
Squash" (a gorgeous coffee table book), turned up what is to this point
the first American mention of zucchini in the 1919 catalog of Los Angeles' Germain Seed and Plant Co. making it likely that the company
introduced the vegetable commercially in this country.
This was the golden age of So! uthern
The zucchini evidently caught on quickly here. The next year, less than 20
years after its discovery in Italy, the Germain
catalog had an entire page devoted to the squash, including pictures and
recipes from a downtown restaurant called Cafi Marcell, run by Joe Marcell Annechini at 215 W. 4th St.
In a 1921 story in The Los Angeles Times extolling the treasures to be found in
local ethnic restaurants, the writer enthuses: "Wise is he who waives his
customary steak and potatoes, and instead scans the menu for real fare of sunny
Italia. Zucchini, for instance, that Italian squash which Signor Marcel and
others import especially. It may be
served in different styles, but the favorite is when, cut into small succulent
squares it is breaded a! nd
fried in olive oil. Ah!"
That squash at Marcell was almost certainly not
imported can you imagine what a
zucchini would look like after a several-weeks ocean voyage? But the fact that
it was described as such is testimony to the cachet of the new vegetable. As is
the fact that later in that same year, the Thanksgiving menu of the Victor Hugo
restaurant, at 623 S. Hill St., gave zucchini prominent billing alongside
ravioli "genoise" and Imperial Valley Tom
Turkey.
Chef A.L. Wyman, who wrote a weekly Times column called "Practical
Recipes: Hints for Epicures and All Who Appreciate Good Cooking," was an
early champion of the zucchini as well, pushing his curious readers to try all
sorts of preparations, including stuffing them with bread crumbs and almonds.
Of course the road to adoption was not entirely smooth. Though Germain recommended picking zucchini at the quite sensible
length of 5 1/2 inches, photographs from the period clearly show that this was!
often ignored.
Looking at faxed photographs from The Times database of "Italian
squash,"
"But it also occurs to me," he wrote, "why
are all of the pictures of such mature fruits? They are certainly not very good
in the kitchen at that size. Perhaps the gardening public was not as yet
familiar with this stuff to know that the fruits had to be picked when very
young."
These are not the only early references that are ambiguous. For example, in an
1898 article, someone who called himself the "Country Gentleman"
touted California as "The Italy of America" (some things never
change), and told of being served an entree he describes as "a sort of
chowder formed by baking slices of Italian squash, tomato, onion and giblets of
fowls with plenty of sweet butter."
All of these squashes could have been zucchini, but possibly not. Why the
confusion? How hard can it be to spot! a zucchini?
Pretty darned difficult, it turns out. In fact, many of the squashes we now
call zucchini really aren't zucchini at all.
This is just another part of the long and tangled history of the squash family.
Squash as we now know it was introduced to Europe by
They were used to describe what today are called gourds (though they were
cooked at the time, they rarely are today).
Courgette and
zucchini are the diminutives of these words literally "little squashes."
Curiously, zucchini underwent a gender transformation somewhere along the line.
The grammatical plural of zucca is zucchine a feminine noun. It is still called that
in many places in
Squash is part of the large and widely varied cucurbit family, which includes
cucumbers and most melons. From a cook's point of view, squash can be divided
into two main categories: winter varieties, which are allowed to mature fully
and develop a hard shell; and summer, which are picked immature while their
skins are still tender.
Zucchini is a summer squash, of course, but hardly the only one. There are
several main groups, categorized mainly by shape. There are scalloped squashes
that are somewhat flattened with decorated edges. And there are crooknecks and
straight necks, with bulbous shapes where the neck is much slimmer than the
body. Those are obvious enough.
But from there it gets confusing. There are three different families of squash
that resemble the zucchini (and today are sold as zucchini). They are all
roughly cylindrical in shape and green in color. The diffe!
rences are in the details.
The first is called a vegetable marrow. These are somewhat dumpy looking,
tapering from flower end to neck and are typically gray-green. They are the
ones frequently seen in Mexican markets. Then there is the family called cocozelle, which is very long, frequently curving,
sometimes slightly bulbous and usually darker green with lighter stripes
running their length.
According to
True to form
TRUE zucchini are of moderate length, straight and have very little, if
any, ta! per. They are
usually very dark green, almost black (in fact, one of
the first commercial varieties sold in the
There are also gold zucchini varieties, but these are of very recent vintage.
The first, and still one of the most popular, gold
zucchini was released in 1973 and was developed by a breeder named Oved Shifriss (he also developed
the 'Big Boy' tomato).
Though there are round, green summer squashes that are called zucchini such as
'Ronde de Nice' and 'Tondo
di Nizza' (probably the same variety from different
areas), these are actually a kind of summer pumpkin that is picked very young.
The differences among all these squashes are more than cosmetic. They have
different flavors and textures. Marrow squashes, which are especially popular
in the Middle East and
Zucchini, of which there are now more than 100 varieties available, range
somewhere in between (indeed, many of the summer squash now sold as zucchini
are actually cocozelle or marrows or hybrid crosses
between the various families).
Still, these differences in color and shape can give you a hint as to the
flavor and texture of squash you find in the market. If, for example, it has a
distinct taper and a grayish color (such as the ones sold in Mexican markets
for making cocido), odds are it will be firm
but not very distinctive in taste. Generally, the deeper the
color, the richer the flavor.
What's that, you say? Flavorful zucchini? Though
widely regarded as bland, their taste really can be rich, though subtle.
To get the best sense of what zucchini tastes like, cook them most simply. Cut
up some zucchini (long wedges work best because they'll keep their texture) and
put them in a skillet with a peeled whole clove of garlic, 2 or 3 tabl! espoons
of water and a healthy glug-glug of olive oil. Cover
the pan and cook over medium heat just until the squash begins to become
tender, about 5 minutes.
Remove the lid, turn up the heat to high and reduce the liquid to a syrupy
glaze. Cook until the zucchini begin to sizzle and brown, 3 or 4 minutes.
Season with salt and serve.
Cooked through, crisply
THE most common mistake people make when preparing zucchini is cooking it
until it turns limp and watery. To be at its best, the squash should be
thoroughly cooked, but still offer a bit of crispness, or at least resistance
to the bite. You can manage this by cooking it for a short time, of course, or
by varying the size of the pieces you're cooking.
Zucchini that will be cooked quickly can be cut in small pieces, even shredded.
If you're going to cook the squash for a while, leave it in large chunks.
In a salad with pine nuts, for example, the zucchini is cut in small pieces and
th! en
salted to draw out some of the moisture, "cooking" it without heat
and revealing the squash's sweet, nutty heart.
Dress the zucchini with olive oil and lemon juice and flavor it with red onion
and basil, but the pine nuts will really set up the flavor of the squash.
You get a completely different picture of zucchini by cutting it a little
bigger and cooking it in agrodolce, the
Italian version of sweet and sour. Made this way, zucchini becomes a bracing
dish that is perfect for serving alongside grilled meat on a hot summer
evening.
Or you can make zucchini meaty enough to serve as a main dish on its own by
cutting it in thick quarters and stewing it gently with sweet long-cooked
onions and a roasted poblano chile
in Mexican cream. Sprinkle it with some crumbled cotija
cheese to make it more substantial.
But however you choose to cook zucchini, do it with care. After all, it is
practically one of our own, and that dish may be the only monu!
ment it will ever get.
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