Baked Zucchini Coins

Last week, my cousin Rochelle posted a status on Facebook about how she was "in love" with zucchini coins. That was enough to spark my interest. So I headed out the web to find the recipe. Funny enough, the recipe came from Weelicious which is a site dedicated to cooking for kids although I did find the recipe on other sites but it didn't come with the cute name. Plus, I took a quick spin around the site and there were a lot of great looking recipes on there. I plan to spend some more time browsing and hopefully cooking some more recipes from the site.

I've had zucchini bread before but I couldn't think of any other time I've eaten zucchini so I didn't really know what to expect. I got my three breading stations ready and started assembling. The process wasn't difficult, just a little messy. A quick tip when breading: use one hand in the wet ingredients and the other in the dry ingredients. It will cut down on the messy hands a little because you will keep yourself from breading your own fingers.

When they come out of the oven, you will be tempted to grab one and pop it in your mouth...DON'T. Those little things were hot! Give them a moment or two to cool and then chow down. I dipped mine in some leftover pizza sauce. They were delicious! Extra crunchy on the outside and soft in the middle. The breading was fantastic. I'm brainstorming to see what else I can bread with it. I'll let you know how those experiments turn out. In the meantime, I highly recommend you pick up a couple zucchini on your next grocery run and give this recipe a try.

Baked Zucchini Coins
http://weelicious.com/2010/06/15/baked-zucchini-coins/

1/2 c. whole wheat panko bread crumbs (I used regular panko because that's what I had)
1/4 c. Parmesan cheese, grated (I freshly grated mine but I bet you could use the store bought kind)
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1 large egg
1/4 c. flour
2 medium zucchini, cut into 1/4 inch "coins"

Preheat oven to 450 degrees and coat a large baking sheet with cooking spray. Mix the first 4 ingredients in a bowl. Whisk the egg in a separate bowl. Place the flour in another bowl. Make an assembly line with the bowls, and first dip the zucchini coins into the flour, then the egg and finally into the bread crumb mixture, coating evenly and repeating with all the zucchini coins. Place all of the coins on the baking sheet. Arrange so they’re not touching, spray with oil and bake for 20 minutes or until the bread crumbs are golden.

Enjoy!
-Erin