Tuna melt zucchini boats

Serves:

Ingredients

• 1 tsp olive oil
• 1 garlic clove (large, minced)
• 400 g canned tomatoes (diced)
• 1/2 tsp basil (dried)
• 1/2 tsp oregano (dried)
• 1 tsp sugar

Zucchini boats

• 4 zucchini (medium, cut in half)
• 425 g canned tuna in vegetable oil (drained)
• 4 spring onion (finely sliced)
• 1 tomato (medium, chopped)
• 1 tsp basil (dried)
• 2 tsp olive oil
• 1/2 cup 50% less-fat cheddar cheese (grated)

Method

To make the tomato sauce: Put oil and garlic in a small saucepan and place on low heat. Cook for a minute or so until garlic is fragrant. Add remaining ingredients and bring to a simmer. Simmer for 10 minutes.

Heat oven to 200C (180C fan-forced). Spray a large shallow casserole (or lasagne) dish lightly with oil or line with baking paper.

Scoop flesh out of zucchini using a teaspoon (keep flesh for filling).

Bring a large saucepan of water to the boil and add zucchini halves for 1.5 minutes before removing from water and patting dry.

Combine half of the chopped zucchini flesh (keep the rest for a stir-fry, hash, lasagne or even to mash through potato), with the tuna, spring onion, tomato and dried basil together and stuff into zucchini. Drizzle over olive oil and then spoon over the tomato sauce.

Top with cheese and bake for 20-30 minutes. Serve with a large green salad.

Note

• I‰ve specified that this recipe feeds 4 people; this will depend on how hungry you are and how many big eaters you have in the family. My husband will eat two boats easily (1 whole zucchini), while my girls may only eat one boat. They will save in the fridge for tomorrow so don‰t be too concerned about cooking too much!
• Play around with the herbs you use in the sauce to find out what your favourite flavour combo is.
• This recipe was created by Jay Rogers for Kidspot, New Zealand’s best recipe finder.