VendrediFriday: Zucchini with Veal Meatballs

Mandy and Sté stopped by last night for the summer's first official VendrediFriday (yes, I know it's mid-July, but time flies, OK?). Before a record-breaking hand of UNO (note to self: don't buy knock-off card games at the dollar store, it's just asking for trouble), we concocted a mainly farm-to-table meal of summer bounty from the farmer's market, the garden upstate, my mom's garden, and my window.

We started with the perfectly-ripe melon Mandy scored at her local farmer's market, which she sliced and wrapped in bresaola (cured beef). Quick, easy, and delicious.

Next up was grilled zucchini (from my mom's garden in Pennsyltucky) with veal meatballs. Initially, we were going to stuff the zucchini, but decided to do some quick stove top cooking instead of turning on the oven on a relatively hot, humid summer's evening.

We were truly making it up as we went along, so into about a pound of ground veal we threw a minced shallot, two large handfuls of chopped fresh basil, a few minced sundried tomatoes, and a little cayenne, salt, and freshly ground black pepper. We sautéed the meatballs in a cast iron skillet, cooked the zucchini in the grill pan, and served it all topped with a little pimentón.

We rounded out the meal with some raw zucchini and a salad, both from the garden upstate (another note: don't mix mint with bitter greens...wow...is all I'm sayin'), and Zinfandel from Mandy and Sté's recent trip to California. Basically, it was all out of this world...and we were very happy.