Pizza-Stuffed Zucchini Boatswith sausage / garlic bread
Our community loved this dish in 2016, so we are bringing it back! Inspired by the flavors of pizza, zucchini makes a sturdy shell for a filling of Italian sausage, bell peppers, and mozzarella. If you like a little spice, use spicy sausage or top the baked zucchini with red pepper flakes. This video shows steps for the original version.
Ingredients
- Bell peppers, any color - 1, diced
- Cheese, fresh mozzarella - 5 oz, thinly sliced
- Garlic - 2 cloves, chopped
- Zucchini, medium - 4, halved
- Oil, olive - 1 Tbsp
- Italian seasoning - 1 tsp
- Salt - 1/2 tsp
- Black pepper - 1/4 tsp
- Oil, cooking - 1 Tbsp + 1 Tbsp
- Italian sausage, loose and raw - 12 oz (sub any variety loose, raw sausage)
- Tomatoes, crushed (14 oz / 397 g) - 1 can
- Red pepper flakes (opt) - 1/2 tsp
- Cheese, Parmesan - 1 oz, grated
- Garlic - 2 cloves, chopped
- Parsley - 2 Tbsp, chopped
- Butter - 2 Tbsp
- Baguette or ciabatta - 8 oz
Nutrition Facts
Prep
- Bell peppers / Cheese (for zucchini and bread) / Garlic (for zucchini and bread) - Prep as directed. Store separately. (Can be done up to 5 days ahead)
- Zucchini - Slice in half lengthwise and then use a spoon to scoop out the center of each zucchini half, leaving ~1/2” / 1.25 cm thick shell on all sides (discard the center you scoop out or save it for another purpose). Check out this video. (Can be done up to 4 days ahead)
- Parsley - Chop parsley. (Can be done up to 2 days ahead)
- Prep garlic bread - Heat butter in microwave just until soft, 10 to 20 seconds. Combine butter with garlic (portion for bread), cheese (portion for bread), and parsley . Slice bread open lengthwise and spread with garlic butter.
Make
- Heat oven to 400F / 204C. Set out two sheet pans.
- While oven heats, set garlic bread, cut-side up on the first sheet pan. Set aside.
- Brush the second sheet pan with some cooking oil. Place zucchini halves on pan, cut-side facing up.
- Whisk together olive oil, garlic (portion for zucchini), Italian seasoning, salt, and pepper. Brush onto cut-side of zucchini halves.
- Transfer pan to heated oven and bake until zucchini halves are starting to turn tender and golden, 10 to 12 minutes.
- While zucchini cooks, heat a saucepan with first part of cooking oil over medium-high heat. Add bell peppers with a pinch of salt and saute until peppers are starting to turn tender, ~2 minutes.
- Add second part of cooking oil and then sausage to heated oil. Saute sausage, breaking it apart as it cooks until browned, 4 to 5 minutes. Drain any excess liquid from pan.
- Add tomatoes to sausage and simmer until sauce thickens, ~2 minutes more. Season with some salt and pepper.
- Remove zucchini halves from oven.
- Fill zucchini with sauce and top with mozzarella cheese.
- Transfer both sheet pans (zucchini and garlic bread) to oven. Bake until cheese is melted and garlic bread is lightly browned, 10 to 12 minutes.
- Remove from oven and serve immediately. Top zucchini with red pepper flakes if you’d like. Enjoy!
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Reviews
This meal has 27 reviews
We really enjoyed this! We had leftover homemade pasta sauce so used that. Came together quickly and was really tasty!
I was pleasantly surprised by this dish! We substituted veggie sausage and loved the result. Zucchini is a really great low-carb alternative to pizza crust, turns out.
The kids weren't fond of the zucchini "boats" but everyone agreed that the filling was awesome. I'm not sure what could be used to replace the zucchini boats, so I doubt I will make it again if the kids are around, but I thought they were great.
I loved these and thought they were delicious and easy but my husband felt that the zucchini boats were a bit much, a lot to chew and difficult to eat.
Because my husband hates zucchini, I sliced thick slabs of eggplant. I hulled it out and made sure that the bottom wasn't going to leak out the filling. I also added cut up pepperoni. Cooking the eggplant along with the filling (vs. pre-cooking), I saved time and it worked out to be tasty.
Really delicious. Very important for texture to cook the zucchini through. Might use shredded rather than fresh mozzarella in the future - a lot of the fresh mozzarella ball was leftover after 2 servings and I think shredded mozz lasts longer in the fridge.