Zucchini Boats with Spicy Asian Ground Beef
Split a zucchini lengthwise, scoop the center out, and you’ve got a boat that holds everything. While it bakes, you stir-fry diced carrot and lean ground beef with garlic, ginger, soy sauce, and Sriracha until the filling is sticky and fragrant.
Nine ingredients. 20 minutes. 429 kcal and 23g of protein piled into two golden zucchini halves. The kind of dinner you throw together on a Tuesday and eat straight off the baking sheet.
Split a zucchini lengthwise, scoop the center out, and you’ve got a boat that holds everything. While it bakes, you stir-fry diced carrot and lean ground beef with garlic, ginger, soy sauce, and Sriracha until the filling is sticky and fragrant.
Nine ingredients. 20 minutes. 429 kcal and 23g of protein piled into two golden zucchini halves. The kind of dinner you throw together on a Tuesday and eat straight off the baking sheet.
Ingredients
- zucchini 1
- olive oil 1.5 tablespoon
- carrot 1
- garlic 1 clove
- ginger 1 slice
- scallion 1
- 96% lean ground beef 3 ounces
- soy sauce 1 tablespoon
- Sriracha sauce 1 teaspoon
Method
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Preheat the oven to 390°F (200°C).
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Cut the zucchini in half lengthwise and scoop out the insides with a spoon. Place the zucchini halves on the baking sheet and brush the zucchini with half of the oil. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes.
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Wash the carrot and dice it. Mince the garlic clove. Cut or grate the ginger. Slice the scallion into rings.
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Heat the remaining oil in a pan. Add the carrot and cook for 3 minutes. Then add the ground beef along with the ginger and garlic and cook the meat until done in about 4 minutes. Finally, add the soy sauce, Sriracha and scallion and cook for another 2 minutes.
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Remove the zucchini boats from the oven, place them on a plate and top them with the meat mixture. Season with pepper to taste.
Scoop the zucchini halves deep enough to hold the filling but leave a wall about half a centimeter thick. Too thin and the boats collapse under the beef mixture, too thick and you run out of room for filling.
Behind this recipe
Can I use regular ground beef instead of 96% lean?
Absolutely. Fattier ground beef works fine and adds more flavor. The macros shift: 80% lean ground beef adds roughly 13g more fat per serving than the 96% lean version, bringing the total closer to 41g fat and 540 kcal. If you're tracking, adjust accordingly.
Does heating olive oil to 200°C destroy its benefits?
Research found that olive oil retains its beneficial compounds even at high cooking temperatures. This recipe uses olive oil twice, brushing the zucchini before baking at 200°C and stir-frying the filling, and both applications stay well within olive oil's proven stability range.
Read the full evidence reviewDoes cooking garlic in a hot pan destroy its health benefits?
Partially. Crushing or mincing garlic activates an enzyme that produces allicin, the compound linked to most of garlic's studied health properties. Heating garlic immediately after cutting can reduce allicin formation. Research suggests letting minced garlic rest before cooking helps preserve more of those compounds, which happens naturally in this recipe since you prep the garlic in Step 3 and don't add it to the pan until partway through Step 4.
Read the full evidence review
