Healthy Baked Zucchini Sticks
Today I have a delicious recipe for healthy baked zucchini sticks. They’re perfect for when you have a hankering, but don’t want the greasy, fried variety found at most restaurants.
First, here’s a bit about what I’ve been up to lately: shopping for bridesmaid dresses!
Steps for Trying on Bridesmaid Dresses
1. Shop with the bride (of course), but also bring a friend who has a keen eye for fashion and tells you like it is.
2. Try on something that makes you feel like a cast member of Grease or West Side Story, just because you have to.
(You should have seen my rendition of “America.”)
3. Follow it up with an amazing lunch.
I’ve always been scary stoked for Meg and Kyle’s wedding (even before Kyle proposed), but it felt so far away. Now that the plans are starting to fall into place – we know the date and venue, Meg has her dress (and looks absolutely breathtaking in it, as expected) – it’s going to be here before we know it. We got Liv’s dress quite a while ago and I can’t wait to dance with her at the wedding! Something about babies dancing in fancy clothes is the best thing ever.
Healthy Baked Zucchini Sticks
I’ve been having a mad hankering for zucchini sticks, but haven’t seen them on a menu recently. I’ve always chosen the zucchini sticks over the cheese variety because once I choked on a mozzarella stick. I popped the entire thing in my mouth, the stringy cheese got stuck on the way down, I tried to swallow and then looked around wide-eyed as I sputtered and hacked. Thankfully my mom saved me. Since then, I’ve gravitated towards the zucchini and mushroom fried appetizers. Bonus: there’s a vegetable hidden under the oil and breaded coating!
Since they’re usually fried up in oil, I thought it would be fun to try a healthier at-home baked version.
Not only is it better health-wise, but I’ve been known to set off the smoke alarm making a grilled chicken salad. Frying scares me.
The secret ingredient is….
brown rice crisp cereal!!
I thought it would be a delicious option instead of bread crumbs, and it made a lovely crispy crust.
Brown rice crisp cereal would also be a perfect chicken, seafood, veggie or tofu coating.
Here’s the recipe if you’d like to give it a try!
Baked Zucchini Sticks
Ingredients
- 1.5 cups brown rice crisp cereal
- 1/2 tsp oregano
- 1/2 tsp thyme
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- pinch of cayenne
- olive oil spray
- 3 small zucchini
- 2 eggs
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400.
- Pulse cereal and herbs and spices in the food processor. You can make it as fine or as textured as you’d like.
- Spray a cookie sheet with olive oil.
- Slice up your zucchini into sticks.
- Whisk one egg and one egg white in a bowl.
- Dip the zucchini into an egg mixture, then into the brown rice crispy coating. The more crisps, the better.
- Place the breaded zucchini sticks onto the prepared cookie sheet.
- Spray with olive oil.
- Bake for 18-20 minutes.
- Serve with ranch dressing or marinara.
You could also cover them with goat cheese, heat in the microwave and eat with a fork. Not that I’ve tried it. 😉
Hope you have a great day and I’ll see ya later!
xoxo
Gina
On the fashion page: Hair-growing tips from Meg
Also, the triple threat workout in case you missed it!
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Making this today.
I do the same with cheese sticks! 🙂 Saves a lot of fat and calories – plus I add some Italian seasoning to the breadcrumb (or in this case, krispy) mixture.
Great recipe Gina!! I usually sub herbed whole-grain cracker crumbs any time a recipe calls for bread crumbs. PS love the photo of you in the Grease/West Side Story-esque outfit. Now THAT is what I want at my wedding! 🙂 LOL!
I don’t have any zucchini, but I do have some giant mushroom caps and a box of Rice Krispies… Guess I know what I’m having for lunch 🙂
OMG. YUM. Making these!!!!!!!
The zuke sticks look aaaamazing. So crispy and decadent looking, without all the yucky grease! Definitely going to try this out.
These look amazing! I love that you used brown rice cereal as a coating in these! What a different idea! I bet they’re delicious!
Zucchini must be a magical food. I’ve started using it in so many different ways!!! Pasta, roasted, chips, slaw, and now I’ll try fries! Fun idea.
This comes just in time for me. I like zucchini but I only know a couple of healthy ways of making it. Thanks for sharing!!
LOOOVE zucchini! I love making pasta out of them 😀 I’m def gonna try this, it looks fun!
YUM! Sounds delicious!
I have tried other recipes for zucchini sticks before but have always been a but disappointed.
Brown rice crispers is a great idea, I can’t wait to try these!
Two things:
1. I have always been terrified of that happening to me with cheese sticks!!! When I eat them, I concentrate very, very hard, do not talk or interact with who I’m having dinner with until I have successfully chewed and swallowed! And even them, I am still a bit weary until they go down 🙂
2. THANK YOU for the healthy zucchini recipe!!! I’ve eaten these from a restaurant here but didn’t like they were fried and have been wanting to make them forever so I am so stoked for this baked recipe. I am off to whole foods to snatch up these items and make them tonight 🙂
Great post as always 🙂
I made something similar using sweet potatoes but never with zucchini…..must change that b/c these look great, Gina 🙂
Ahhh these look sooooo good!
I love that the “secret ingredient” is cereal – great idea! And what a better option than french fries – definitely a bit more fiber here than in the alternative.
Yum! I was just looking at my last zucchini of the season wondering what the heck I was going to do with it.
And your apple salad from Blue Willow looks delicious! It was one of my favorite things when I worked there. Makes me miss the place and Tucson soooo much!
blue willow is one of my absolute favorites- everything is so good!
Rice Krispies?! Would have never thought about that, such a great idea! Do you ever cook with panko? I’ve made some fries using that before.
I have to try this sometime… now to get a box of Rice Crispies…
Love the idea of brown rice krispies. I would have just used GF bread but I like your idea of switching it up. Yum!!!
These look amazing! I love that they are gluten free! I will definitely be making them soon. YUM!
The quote at the end of your post is soo literally thought provoking. The power of positive thinking makes a difference!
Mmmmm… I need to go to the store! Thanks for the post I love zucchini! 🙂
is that meg in the picture with liv (so cute!)? she looks exactlyyyy like zoey deschanel…she will make a stunning bride i am sure 🙂
Brown rice kris pies in ingenious!!! I would have never thought of that! Also, I’m assuming that is Meg in the first pic with Liv- and she is STUNNING. She will be a gorgeous bride 🙂
This is perfect for us gluten free-bies!
I made baked goat cheese… puffs? the other day. They were just little bites, instead of long strings, and they were amazing. I used the gluten free Bisquick’s chicken tender breading ingredients with just a few tweakings.
These look SO good! I’ve got to go find some zucchini!! Thanks for sharing!
I made zucchini fries over the weekend using brown rice crisps too!!! Who needs bread crumbs anyways. I added parmesan cheese to the crumbly mixture and it was phenom.
Omg, I’ve chocked on a fried cheese stick too, the cheese fell right out of the coating and got stuck in my throat! It’s scary how easily that can happen. These sounds like heaven though! And they look so delicious. I definitely want to make them, thanks!
Gah! Zucchini! I knew I forgot something on my Trader Joe’s run – and now having seen these tasty little numbers, I regret not picking them up even more! Love the idea of using brown rice crispies!
Zucchini sticks look mighty tempting; I saw Fitsugar posted your link! Also, that chicken on the salad looks wonderful.
I want to try this! Although I may have to get a food processor, I really didn’t have to have an excuse! That dress looked like so much fun!
I just picked up some zucchini from the farmers market on Saturday. They’re actually quite cute – almost confused as to whether they wanna be green or yellow zucchinis because they have spots of both on them! Probably what made me buy them 😉 I love this idea as a healthy alternative, especially dipped in marinara! That totally has me sold!!
I rarely comment but I just wanted to say that Liv is getting cuter and cuter by the day (if that’s possible!).
Not a fan of zucchini, but this might be method number 2 to get me to eat it. (number 1 is baked into something yummy).
This is such a cute post. I totally agree that babies in fancy clothes are the best thing ever. And the fries look amazing!!
Love this idea! Although I might have to make mozzarella sticks to serve along with them… those are such a guilty pleasure of mine! 😀
That dress makes you look like the girl “Jaja de gregorio” who stole Danny from Sandy at the dance in Grease. I don’t know the real name, but that’s the phonetic spelling – nice 🙂
Just made these and they were great! I used regular Rice Krispies and they worked out just fine.
awesome!