Continuing along with my kind of healthy trend, I needed to express how delightful and delicious zucchini is, and how it can be eaten with anything. I used to buy my zucchini in Carlisle from the local farmers market and am always overjoyed to make something with zucchini in it. But, alas, winter is here and zucchini season is not for a while, so there farmers market is not selling the vegetable. I could always grab one from Walmart, but I’m not quite sure how I feel about a Walmart zucchini or how great that would be. Nevertheless, that did not stop me from achieving my goal of finding a beautiful fresh zucchini. The past weekend I visited my brother in Philly, and because he loves to shop for fresh fruit I was ecstatic to tag along for a grocery excursion. He thought it bizarre that I bought zucchini and and an avocado to take back with me, but that’s just what I have to do when nothing is close to me. I went back to college with my zucchini in my bad thinking of all the different ways I could experiment with this zucchini. Zoodles was such a big food trend at the time and I wanted to make something along those lines. But normally I only saw zoodles as a substitute for pasta with cheese or some sort of pasta sauce, and I wanted to make something different, unique. I looked at what I had in my kitchen and decided to make zoodles and tandoori chicken strips. I also do not have a zoodler because I’m a college student and only spend my money on food, but I made do with a knife and a little bit of cutting skills. The tandoori chicken curry zoodles were perfect, and broke the mold of zucchini noodles as pasta.

So here goes the recipe (for 2 people depending how much you eat):

Ingredients:

• 1 small zucchini
• 2 lbs boneless chicken
• Tandoori chicken Shan Masala as much as needed depending on spice level (yes I always use Shan Masala I should advertise for them)
• 2 tsp curry Powder
• 1 tsp cumin Powder
• 1 tsp ginger paste
• 1 tsp garlic paste
• Lemon juice of 1 lemon
• Salt and Pepper to taste
• 1 tbsp olive oil

Method:

Cut the zucchini into really thin strips and place in a bowl. Cut the chicken into thin strips and marinade with salt, pepper, ginger, garlic, curry powder, cumin powder and lemon juice. Let the chicken marinade for about 3 hours if possible to get all the flavors settled in. In a medium sized frying pan, add olive oil and the chicken. Stir until the chicken has browned quite decently. Pour water until all the chicken is under water and cover and let it cook on medium heat for about 8 minute. Take the cover off, turn the heat to high and let the excess water boil off until a medium thick curry consistency remains. Add the chicken curry strips to the zoodles and there you have it, Indianized zoodles!

Written by Fatema Sachak