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I have multiple recipes for soup that include zucchini (courgette) that are all at least 30-40 years old, and all of them seem to have you add the zucchini late in the cooking time, as if the zucchini needs to be treated gently. But my experience is that zucchini needs to be cooked with no uncertain vigor, and I will generally add it earlier/cook it longer.

Question is: are “modern” US supermarket zucchini substantially different from those of the past, perhaps in the same way that science has given us hard, flavorless supermarket tomatoes — or do I just prefer softer zucchini than these cookbook authors?

Ernest Friedman-Hill
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2 Answers2

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To answer the question directly: no, there is no difference in the zucchini. I grew up with the zucchini in my grandmothers' gardens, and nowadays, I'm eating supermarket zucchini - this is in Europe, but I don't think the big growers are selling something radically different in the US.

To my taste, all the zucchinis I've ever had, supermarket or homegrown, are very tender and should be heated minimally. Especially in something like a soup, I'd also add them very late, maybe even after I've turned off the heat.

It seems that you have a personal preference for long-cooked zucchini. This has nothing to do with the recipe, its age, or with the zucchini supply. The recipes are the same, the zucchinis are the same, your taste simply differs.

rumtscho
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Cooking zucchini for a long time removes most of its water, greatly reducing its volume and turning it into a "pulp".

If that's the effect you want to achieve, then you indeed add it early in the cooking process (I do it for example when making a zucchini and salmon pie, or a soup).

If you instead want to preserve its texture and leave some crunchiness, you add it later in the recipe (extreme example: diced raw zucchini in salads)

It's possible that modern zucchini has a higher amount of water (selected to make it grow bigger and faster) than the zucchini of the past, therefore requiring more time to take that water away when needed.

L.Dutch
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