Marscapone Courgetti / Zoodles

Courgetti ("spaghetti made of courgettes") or Zoodles ("noodles made of zucchini") is something we have heard about for a while now, yet never tried.  Luckily my sister has a Spiralizer.  This is a machine that can cut vegetables (e.g. courgette or carrot) into noodles. This means you can take your favourite spaghetti or noodle dishes and take out the carbs, replacing them with veggie goodness.

Now you may think that the £25-£30 for a the Spiralizer machine is a bit steep until you know you would get your use out of it.  Well we have just found this alternative, which is a hand held version for under £5.  We have just purchased this, so will give it a go and let you know.

So here is a cheesy Italian dish that used "courgetti" as it's base!

Ingredients (for 3 people)

• 3 Courgettes

• 1 onion

• 3 garlic cloves

• A couple of handful peas

• 5 sliced Mushrooms

• Mascarpone

• Halloumi

• Oil of your choice

 Method

1. Heat the oil in a pan. Slice the halloumi cheese and fry until nicely golden brown on each side. While the halloumi is cooking finely chop the garlic cloves (feel free to use more or less than me- I like things garlicy!!) and slice the onion.
2. Once the halloumi is cooked take it out the pan and place to the side (I also chopped it up at this stage into more bitesize pieces). Then add the garlic and onion to the pan and keep on a medium heat for around 5-7 minutes. Add the peas (if frozen, if not then add them at the same time as the courgette) and the mushrooms. Keep cooking for another 5 minutes or so- until the onion is about 80% cooked.
3. While the onion and garlic is cooking away spiralizeyour courgettes ready to add in.
4. Once the onion, garlic, peas and mushroom mix has cooked to the 80% add in the courgette (and peas if they weren’t added in step 2)
5. Keep this on a medium heat for another 5 minutes or so- until the courgette has heated through and then reduce the heat to a low temperature. Add in the mascarpone and mix until the mascarpone has turned in a sauce. Add the halloumi back in a keep on a low heat until everything is heated through and cooked to suit you.
6. Serve straight from the pan and add some parmesan cheese on top.

A lot of the ingredients in this can be swapped/missed out so it’s very easy to make it suit your own taste. Also the quantities are to your own preference. In general I would do at least 1 courgette per person and around 70-80g of mascarpone cream per courgette. However having too much mascarpone is never a bad thing. I think it would also be great with broccoli, asparagus, spring onion and peppers so it’s a great recipe when you need to use things up in the fridge.