Cookoff at Malaprop’s: Part II

Last week, Malaprop’s held a vegetarian cooking competition with a focus on local ingredients. There was one sweet category, one savory; the winner of the sweet competition was posted last week. Here is the winning savory recipe, provided by cook and kombucha brewer Cale LeFevre. 

Says LeFevre: “Here is the recipe for the fritters, the chutney and the yogurt sauce. I was making them up as I went, so … this is my best estimate.”

Squash Fritters:

1 Zucchini
2 Squash (yellow summer)
1 Potato
1/2 onion, diced (or a few small garden onions)
1/4 c. chopped cilantro or basil
1 ear of corn, cut from cob
1 egg
1/3 c. beer
goat cheese (whatever kind you like)
vegetable oil
salt/pepper
any spices you may want to season with (cumin, etc)
Matzoh meal

Chop zucchini, squash and potatoes, and boil until they are very soft and can be mashed. Drain well, and continue to cook off excess water. Add beer and cook down liquid almost completely. Mash the mixture and let it cool.

After it has cooled, add the onion, spices, salt and pepper, cilantro or basil and egg. Hand mix until everything is evenly distributed. Add matzoh meal and mix, and continue to add matzoh meal until the mixture can be formed into a ball in your hand without sticking to your fingers or losing its shape. Form a ball the size of a golf ball, and flatten in the palm of your hand. Add a dollop (or some crumbles) of goat cheese to the center, and form the mixture around the cheese until it is surrounded.
Drop the ball into enough hot oil to cover it (or at least cover it more than half way).  Leave the oil on med-hi heat and flip accordingly until the ball is dark golden brown.

Chutney:

3 green tomatoes
1 green apple (cut in half — separate the halves)
a few fresh basil leaves
brown mustard seed
1/2 onion, chopped
black pepper
1 tbsp garlic, minced
1 tsp ginger, minced
1/4 c. brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp. honey
a dash or two of white wine
1/4 c. kombucha, soured
pinches of crushed red pepper
spices to taste—some cumin or cinnamon tastes great

Cook tomatoes and 1/2 of the apple and boil until very soft and can be mashed. Half-way through, add the rest of the ingredients and continue to add water and boil if the tomatoes or apples are not soft (this may take an hour or more). Cook off all water and cool in refrigerator. Mince the other half of the apple, and fold the fresh apple into the mixture once it has cooled.

Yogurt sauce

Yogurt
Water
Pepper
Garlic powder
Green onion garnish
Soured Kombucha

This is really up to you. I substituted soured kombucha for apple cider vinegar for both the yogurt and the chutney. I make 4 to 5 gallons of kombucha every week and a half, but I had one batch sit in the heat for too long, so it got extra sour (but still good). Any combination of these things in the yogurt will make a delicious and cooling yogurt sauce to dip the fritters in, with or without the chutney.

Most of the ingredients came from my garden, my friends’ gardens, the CSA through the Fresh Quarter, or a Farmers market. The goat cheese was “Goat Lady” cheese from Greenlife, and I made the kombucha!