Why Salting Your Zucchini Noodles Changes Everything

How on earth do people replace pasta noodles with a vegetable!?

If you’re someone who has an aversion to all things green, I think zucchini might just be one of the most visually unappealing vegetables to get behind. I mean they’re phallic, green, and kind of look like a cucumber inside.

They can be roasted, sautéed, fried, stuffed, and even snuck into a loaf of bread. But their best served, in my humble opinion in noodle form!

As someone who could never understand how on earth one could replace pasta noodles with zucchini, I have 100% been converted!

How to make zucchini noodles the right way

While making zucchini noodles can be a great bicep workout, it’s definitely not as simple as grabbing a box of dried pasta from the pantry. But since we’re healthy folks (let’s fake it til we make it) why not get an upper body workout in while we hand craft our zucchini’s into strands of goodness, otherwise known as zucchini noodles!

Watch this video for a delicious feta dish using zucchini noodles!

Zucchini noodles fail because when added to sauces or a meal, the water content can overwhelm the dish.

Did you know: zucchini is 90% water!? What!

These are facts and exactly why when you add just zoodled zucchini to a meal, the water content can dilute your sauce! Watering down even the most delicious meals.

So how do we get all this water out of the zucchini before cooking!? The secret is salt and a process called disgorging!

After using a spiralizer to turn your zucchini into noodles (I use this spiralizer - click here) you need to liberally salt your zucchini noodles.

You can either lay out your zucchini on clean dish towels or paper towels, salt, and wait 30 minutes for the salt to pull the water from the noodles. I’ve done this before and ended up with every inch of my counter tops with paper towels and zucchini!

The more convenient method is to put your zucchini noodles into a colander or strainer with a bowl resting underneath to catch the water that drains from the vegetables. You add you zoodles to the colander, liberally salt and mix together.

Place the noodles in your fridge for at least 30 minutes to an hour. Overnight works great and is perfect for meal prep.

Watch this video to see me disgorging the zucchini noodles!

Watch this video to see my exact process of removing the water from zucchini noodles

There you have it - perfect zucchini noodles every time!

No, the zucchini noodles don’t taste salty. I think a lot of the salt comes out with the water that strains from them. If you find your noodles still a bit too liquidy, you can squeeze any additional liquidy out into a towel.