You won't believe how delicious ripe summer vegetables that have been slowly cooked until they collapse can be . This Courgette Caviar (aka Ikra) is an Eastern European way of preserving the bounty of late summer. Perfect for spreading on toast, sandwiches or crispy flour chickpea crackers.
QUICK LOOK: TL:DR
Courgette Caviar Spread (Ikra)
- Prep Time: 20 mins
- Cook Time 1.5 hours (low and slow)
- Total Time 1 hour, 50 mins
- Servings: 10
- Calories: 80 per serving
- Key Ingredients: Courgettes (zucchini), onion, carrots, tomatoes.
- Dietary Info: vegan and gluten-free
- Tasting Notes: sweet and rich from sun ripened vegetables.
Why you'll love this recipe!
- Sweet and Savory: for spreading on toast, on sandwiches and more
- Preserve Summer Glut: make the most of your garden bounty
- Keeps well in freezer: simply freeze and use over winter!
This recipe hails from Slavic / Eastern European countries, including Ukraine. It's a lovely way to use up and preserve end-of-summer vegetables such as zucchini and tomatoes. It's sometimes called vegetable caviar, or poor mans caviar, but to me that undersells the flavor. It tastes of the rich sweetness of sun ripened vegetables, slowly cooked down. If, like me, you always end up with extra zucchini (aka courgettes) you definitely should try this Zucchini Baba Ganoush dip too. Or get out your mandolin and make my favourite Zucchini Scarpaccia.
🍅Key Ingredients
The key to this recipe is good, sun ripened ingredients. Even better if they're from your garden or allotment. Quantities are on the recipe card!
- Courgette (aka zucchini): If you grow your own zucchini, you'll understand the struggle to eat them all up. This recipe can be scaled to use even more!
- Ripe Tomatoes: choose soft, really lovely ripe tomatoes.
- Carrots: for sweetness and to add a little bulk to the vegetable 'caviar'. You only need two or three carrots, so if you have more to use up, check out my Spicy Carrot Tempeh Fritters.
- Onion and Garlic: or shallots for sweetness.
- Herbs: I used only bay leaf, however thyme and oregano would also be delicous.
- A good splodge of olive oil to slowly saute the vegetables in. As always sea salt and a good scrunch of black pepper to taste.
See recipe card for quantities.
🌶️Substitutions & Variations
Here are some yummy ways to switch up the recipe..
- Aubergine or Eggplant -Peel and finely dice some eggplant to cook down into the vegetable caviar.
- Other herbs -fresh parsley, dried or fresh thyme are delicious.
- A little zingy- add a squeeze of fresh lemon juice or a teaspoon of white wine vinegar to balance the sweet flavor.
👩🍳Instructions
This recipe really benefits from a long, slow cook. If you have a slow cooker you can choose to use that!
- Step 1: Finely chop the onions, grate the carrot and zucchini.
- Step 2: Grate the tomatoes into a bowl. This is a quick way to remove their skins.
- Step 3: Soften the onion and garlic with a little olive oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add in the zucchini, garlic, herbs and seasonings. Add in the tomatoes.
- Step 4: Give the mixture a stir and leave on a low heat, covered for at least 45 minutes, stirring occassionally.
- Step 5: By now the mixture will still have some juices. Remove the lid from the pan and keep cooking down, mashing up the vegetables with a spatula or wooden spoon.
- Step 6: When the juices have evaporated, the mixture is ready to use. Pour into glass jars and eat quickly or freeze in portions to use over winter.
Hint: You might need to cook this longer than expected , it varies according to how juicy your vegetables are and the kind of pan you use.
What to serve with Courgette Caviar
If you've made a batch of this delicious vegetable spread, it goes delicously as part of a mezze or grazing platter. Round out the party by serving it with some Lentil Hummus, and of course you'll need some Crispy Flaxseed Crackers to spread them on. My husband likes to eat this for breakfast too, as a side for some leftover mashed potato fritters and maybe some vegan tofu bacon.
Louise's Top tip
Store in an airtight jar in the fridge with a little olive oil over the top to preserve this spread for up to a week.
❓Courgette Caviar FAQ
Zucchini or courgette caviar is a slow cooked spread from Eastern Europe. It's delicious spread on crackers or toast and a great way to use up summer vegetables.
Zucchini and courgette are the same vegetable. In the UK and France it is known as courgette, whereas in Australia, USA, Canada it is known from the Italian word Zucchini.
Some more snacks to try!
Here are some other delicious recipes to try as a snack.
📖 Recipe
Courgette Caviar Spread (Ikra) - Slavic style zucchini Spread
Equipment
- 1 large skillet or pan
Ingredients Note:
For accuracy, I measure all ingredients in metric as standard, then convert and test the recipe for American cup measurements etc.
(Heads up Aussie and UK readers- your measurements in cups are sometimes different, so please use metric or check you have the correct cup and spoon type!!)
Ingredients
- 550 g (1 ⅕ lb) large Courgettes (about 2 large )
- 150 g (1 cup) large onion (or 2-3 shallots)
- 250 g (2 cups) carrots (about 3 small carrots)
- 400 g (2 ⅔ cups) tomatoes
- 4 cloves garlic
- 1 small chilli ((optional, but really yummy))
- 2 bay leaf ((optional but nice))
- 50 ml (3 ⅜ tablespoon) olive oil
- Salt and pepper to taste
- 2 teaspoon oregano or thyme (optional)
Instructions
- Finely chop the onion and garlic. Grate the courgettes, carrot and tomatoes.
- In a large pan add half the olive oil, the onion, carrots, garlic and chilli (if using)150 g large onion, 4 cloves garlic, 1 small chilli, 50 ml olive oil
- Cook over a medium heat for around 7 mins until the onions and carrots are softened.250 g carrots
- Add the courgette/zucchini and the grated tomatos. Mix well.550 g large Courgettes, 400 g tomatoes
- Cook for around 30mins. The courgette should start to collapse releasing all its juices, which you want to slowly cook off.
- Add in the bay leaf. Then, turn the heat down and sloooooowly cook. You want to caramelise the mixture, creating layers of flavour by teasing out all the natural sweetness of the vegetables.2 bay leaf, Salt and pepper to taste, 2 tsp oregano or thyme
- After around 20 mins, remove the bay leaf. It gives an extra layer of flavour, but more than that it turns into a slightly unpleasant & overpowering note.
- Keep cooking down the vegetables, maybe giving them an extra bit of help by bashing them a bit with a potato masher or a wooden spoon to help them disintegrate.
- Keep scraping down the pan, you want this to neaaaaarly catch, but not quite.
- After another 20 - 30 mins, depending on how juicy your tomatoes and courgettes were, you should have a lush, squishy, delicious paste.
- Add some salt to taste and you're done!
- This keeps in the fridge for a week or so, just like pesto. Or sterilise some jars and once filled with no air pockets, add a layer of olive oil, which 'seals' the mix, and you can eat it for longer! Or freeze in portions.
Louise-Claire Cayzer says
This is so delicious spread on toast, and is perfect for using up the last of the summer veggies.
Ross says
You forgot to say how many tomatoes in the ingredients!
Just trying the recipe so I'll take a guess this time.
Louise-Claire Cayzer says
Oh no! The perils of recipe creation.
It was some time ago that I made it, but I have a feeling it was about 3-4 large tomatoes. Roughly equal weight to the courgettes.
Nico @ yumsome says
Oh, yum! This is my kind of dip!
Your courgettes are huge!
louise says
They've been amazing this year.. we might even get a few more before the frosts...x