Bigly Zucchini Boats

Pay attention. Zucchini has a PR problem. I have to tell you something, and you might not want to hear it, but you NEED to hear it: zucchini is one of the greatest vegetables on Earth, I've been saying it for years, way before it was popular, look it up, I had people look it up — and yet people treat zucchini like it's the boring cousin. The sad cousin. The cousin who shows up to Thanksgiving and nobody talks to. Tragedy. A vegetable tragedy.

Not here. Not at BiglyEats. Here, the zucchini gets RESPECT. Here, the zucchini becomes a BOAT — a vessel, a vessel for greatness, a vessel for cheese and tomatoes and herbs and crunchy panko on top — and when you pull these out of the oven, your kitchen smells like an old Italian woman is cooking for you. An actual old Italian woman. An old Italian woman cornered me once at a market in Brooklyn, grabbed my arm, made me promise to do these correctly. I promised. I kept the promise. I've had nonnas since tell me, 'Bigly, the boats. The boats are correct.' That's the highest compliment a nonna gives. 'Correct.' If a nonna calls something correct, it's OVER, you've won, end of discussion.

And the best part — better than all of it — is these boats take TWENTY MINUTES of active work. Twenty minutes. Most chefs are afraid to do this — they want it to look hard, they want you to think it took them three hours, three hours for a vegetable, sad — but it doesn't. Twenty active minutes, half an hour in the oven, dinner on the table. Easy math. Hands down.

Eight gorgeous boats, golden tops, herbs scattered like confetti, the sauce bubbling out the sides — the prettiest thing on the dinner table, not even close. Take a picture. Send it to people. Make them jealous. They WILL be jealous. They'll text back, 'where did you learn this,' and you'll know the answer. The answer is always Bigly. The answer has always been Bigly. You're welcome.