I love the courgette season!
Many home gardeners and allotmenteers love growing courgettes as these summer squashes are easy to look after and usually give an abundant harvest. But it’s surprising how many don’t like eating them as much as they do growing them; they give most of their bounty away. Of course, I am happy to share a few gorgeous courgettes with friends – it’s a lovely feeling giving someone home grown produce picked from the plant moments before. But Pete and I love eating courgettes so it’s very much a case of finding as many ways as possible to enjoy them while they last.
We like to grow different varieties. For many years, we’ve grown yellow spherical courgettes – they taste the same as green ones but look, they’re just so beautiful! We have also grown green balls and both green and yellow varieties of the regular baton shape. I’m thinking about planting some of the pale green or white types next year.
By the way, while we use the French word courgette, the Americans took the word zucchini from Italian, which seems appropriate since courgettes were developed in Italy after the Cucurbita genus was introduced to Europe from the Americas. That said, Americans now seem to refer to yellow courgettes by the umbrella term of summer squash rather than as yellow zucchini, I’m not really sure why.
Any courgette / zucchini variety can be used for this recipe, but it’s best to choose smaller fruits rather than large ones.
Sausage Ragu Stuffed Courgettes
Ingredients
- 1 small onion , diced
- 400 g chopped tomatoes (1 tin)
- 2 tsp fresh oregano, finely chopped (or 1 tsp dried)
- 600 g herby pork sausages , skin removed
- salt
- pepper
- 3-4 small courgettes , halved and scooped out
- 125 g fresh mozzarella , sliced
- fresh oregano , to garnish
Notes
Tip: Read the instructions before starting – you can prep the sausages, courgettes and mozzarella while other elements of the recipe are cooking.
Instructions
- Heat a little vegetable oil in a large frying pan and cook the onion over a low to medium heat, to soften.
- Add the tinned tomatoes and oregano and let the tomato sauce cook. You can peel the sausages during this time.
- Add the sausages to the tomato sauce and use the edge of a wooden spoon to break them into pieces. Continue to break the sausages down, mixing them into the tomato sauce, for the first several minutes of cooking.
- Then cover the pan and leave the ragu to cook for about an hour. During this cooking time, once the sausage is cooked through you can taste for seasoning and add salt and pepper as needed.
- After an hour, remove the lid and turn the heat up a little to allow the sauce to reduce – this will take about 10 to 15 minutes. You want quite a dry ragu, as the courgettes will release juices as they cook. Prepare the courgettes during this time.
- To prepare the courgettes, slice them in half and carefully scoop out the seeds and pulpy flesh from the centre. Leave a nice thick layer of flesh in the skin, and take care not to pierce the skin while you’re working.
- Preheat the oven to 160° C (fan).
- Stuff the courgettes with the ragu and pack down tightly.
- Bake the courgettes for 30 to 40 minutes until the courgettes have softened and the ragu has taken on a little colour.
- Slice the mozzarella finely and arrange over the top of each courgette half. Add a sprig of fresh oregano for decoration, if using.
- Return to the oven and bake for another 15-20 minutes, until the mozzarella has melted and taken on a little colour.
- Serve with your chosen side. You can see that we had some of ours with an extra dose of courgettes in the form of courgette crisps – thinly sliced, lightly floured and deep fried!
Looking for more delicious ideas for courgettes / zucchinis?
- My Quick Courgette & Blue Cheese Soup
- My Courgette, Goat’s Cheese & Mint Frittata
- Pete’s Courgette-saka (a courgette-laden variation on moussaka)
- Mamta’s Vegetable Pakoras
- Elizabeth’s Chocolate Courgette Cake
- Elizabeth’s Spiced Tomato & Courgette Chutney
- Nazima’s Tofu and Courgette Noodle Salad
- Urvashi’s Chocolate & Courgette Brownies
- Gary’s Courgette Carbonara
- Jen’s Courgette & Chamomile Cake
- Helene’s Ratatouille
- Michelle’s Potato, Courgette & Feta Cakes with Mint
- Kellie’s Lemony Courgette Ribbons and Fine Bean Tagliatelle in Herbed Crème Fraiche
- Margot’s Pizza with Grilled Zucchinis, Bechamel and Red Onions
- Laura’s Courgette, Bean and Feta Summer Salad
- Jane Hornby’s Frosted Courgette & Lemon Cake
- BBC Good Food’s Courgette & mushroom Bread
- BBC Good Food’s Crunchy Courgette Pickle
Do you have any favourite recipes for courgettes?
If so, please do share them here – we still have lots more on the plants and I’m always looking for new ways to enjoy them!
(You are welcome to include recipe links in your comments, but they may not appear straight away; comments with links are usually diverted into an approval queue to check they aren’t spam!)
Please leave a comment - I love hearing from you!19 Comments to "Sausage Ragu Stuffed Courgettes"
I do love these baby round courgettes they’re just so pretty but I’d never thought of stuffing them. I do love your sausage stuffing too. Now that’s a sexy bit of stuffing. Ooh err!!
Thanks Dom, we’ve been using them every way we can think of. Love them so much. And thanks, the stuffing was fab. We did try a previous one using Pete’s usual mince ragu but I really wanted to use Italian-style sausage, so we came up with this idea instead. So delicious!
I live courgettes! Like you I have grown them every year. I grew the green round ones and yellow long ones this year. Yet to harvest the yellow ones. I don’t eat meat but I like the idea of stuffing courgettes. It’s such a hearty meal. I might try rice instead and top with the mozzarella as I love cheese too.
Hey Urvashi, I gave one of the globe ones to a colleague and she stuffed with a courgette curry, then baked. Showed me photo, looked delicious!
Although I don’t eat sausage that looks sooo good I’m tempted to try (!) Thanks for mentioning my pizza by the way 😉
Am sure you could do something similar with vegetarian ragu! 🙂
This sounds absolutely heavenly and perfect for these cooler rainy days we’ve been having lately. Yum!
Very comforting!
Yum! Wish we had a garden now just to get a glut of courgettes. My bloke isn’t overly keen on courgettes but I’m sure if I stuffed them with sausage ragu he’d be happy.
We love them, which helps but then we’d not grow as many if didn’t! 🙂
This has of course be pinned straight away – I’d be trying it tonight if I thought my mother would like it but alas it will have to wait for when I’m on my own because she is rather fussy and won’t eat tomatoes. I however think it sounds delicious =)
No tomatoes! {Tries not to look aghast!}
There are lots of lovely things about this.
It gives me an idea of what to do with all the fat yellow globe courgettes this year (my green ones have switched off already but all the yellows are going strong).
A Sauce made with sausage meat is brilliant isn’t it? I always forget, but as the meat is pre-seasoned it’s extra tasty.
I like the idea of the slice of mozzarella on top too…and the courgette chips. All smashing…and making me hungry. I need to go make ‘Massive Meatballs’ now as I have promised them for the boy and his pal who is coming for tea.
Hope you are feeling better very soon, Kavey.
Thanks Claire! Love the sound of Massive Meatballs! 🙂
I remember seeing the courgettes on IG and was looking forward to the actual recipe. I know the sausages are pretty integral (they are in the title!) but I”m sure these would be fab with veggie sages too. Lovely. And thanks for the link love. 🙂
Try a chickpea stew, that may be nice. One of my colleagues took one of my courgettes home and, like you, wanted a veggie alternative, she filled hers with chickpea curry!
They look amazing. I’ve been wanting to try making something with round courgettes for a while and this looks like it worked brilliantly. I shall attempt a veggie version.
See my last reply, yes I think a veggie stew would be lovely!
I’ve tried stuffed courgettes for the first time this year. Must try round courgettes next year. We jus have a small veg patch rather than allotment but it has been generous on the courgette front so appreciating your courgette glut recipes!