Fiori Di Zucca Ripieni ~ Filled Zucchini Flowers

Childhood memories.... back to my first time eating Fiori di Zucca.

It was a hot summer in Italy, at my mothers family home. She cut the flowers of the zucchini plants in their garden and I was shocked. Now the plants will not be able to make zucchini. But my mother reassured me that we will eat something really special.

And special it was!

Since then I was trying to find the flowers, but in Asia they are almost nonexistent or so very expensive.

But now, on my holiday in Europe I found them on the market. I filled and baked them ... and it is no wonder, that there were no leftovers! My sister helped to get rid of them and we were wallowing in memories.

Step 1:

There are two different flowers, the female and the male. The female one has a little zucchini at the end of the flower, the male one doesn't. I used the male flower.

First you have to wash the flowers very carefully and remove the pointy pieces at the end of the flowers.

Step 2:

For the filling:
100 g Cream Cheese
100 g Ricotta
100 g Herb Cream Cheese
Pepper
Paprika
Chili
1 Egg
1/2 bunch Parsley
some Oregano
50 g grated Parmesan

mix all ingredients together and fill into a piping-bag.
Then pipe some of this into the flowers and fold the tips over to close the flower.

Step 3:

Put them into a greased ovenproof dish and bake at 180 C for 20-30 minutes. Serve hot.