Stuffed Zucchini Flowers with Ricotta Cheese

We grow zucchini flowers in our garden over summer just for this dish. The special zucchini flower seeds which we use seem to grow mainly male flowers so there are usually quite a lot of flowers each day to pick. In this dish the flowers are filled with ricotta cheese which has been mixed with fresh oregano from the garden and then steamed. The flowers are served in a butter sauce with pine-nut sauce. They flowers are one of my favourite entrees which are why we grow the zucchini flowers.

around 12 zucchini flowers
a small bunch of fresh oregano, chopped
200g ricotta preferably from a tub of fresh ricotta
50g butter
olive oil
1 tbsp pine nuts, toasted
the juice of 1 lemon

Remove the stamens from inside the flowers and trim the ends. Mix the oregano with the ricotta cheese and season with salt and pepper. Put the mixture into a small plastic sandwich bag and trim of the corner of the bag with a pair of scissors to make a piping bag. Pipe the ricotta mixture into each of the zucchini flowers and seal each flower by twisting the end. Place in a vessel to steam the flowers, drizzling a little olive oil over the flowers. I use a metal colander placed over boiling water in a saucepan and covered with a lid for steaming the flowers.
Steam the flowers for 4 minutes and then place the flowers on a serving plate.
Meanwhile heat the butter in a small pan until it is golden and foaming. Add the pine nuts and the juice of the squeezed lemon. Pour gently over the zucchini flowers and serve immediately.

Garlic Prawns

This is one of my favourite dishes. A Spanish-style dish, it combines the seafood taste of prawns with the a sauce based on garlic and paprika.

a good "glug" of olive oil
3/4 - 1 kg prawns
3-6 garlic cloves, finely chopped - add more if you like garlic
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup of white wine
1 tsp smoked paprika
1⁄2 tsp chilli pepper (to taste)
4 tbsp Italian parsley, chopped
salt and fresh ground pepper

• Peel and devein the prawns.
• In a wide, shallow pan over high heat, heat the olive oil; add the prawns, then add the garlic and sauté quickly for about 2-3 minutes.Add the garlic at a point when the prawns are half cooked so they garlic doesn't blacken.
• Add the lemon juice, paprika, chilli pepper, wine and salt and pepper to taste. Adjust all of these to your liking.
• Finally, transfer the garlic prawns to a warmed serving dish, sprinkle with the chopped parsley and serve at once.