We love zucchini boats in our house. We first tried them when we started a subscription with Hello Fresh and the recipe that got us hooked was this one. I think what we like most is that they’re so versatile and really can be stuffed with whatever you want. For example, here is my recipe for Salsa Verde Chicken Enchilada Zucchini Boats and here is my recipe for Chicken Spinach Alfredo Zucchini Boats. These mushroom swiss ones were so good! They hit the spot when you’re craving a juicy burger, but don’t want to feel like you’ve just had a major gut bomb.
Zucchini Boat Prep
To prepare the zucchini, you trim them and cut them in half lengthwise. After cutting them in half, you’re going to carefully scoop out all of the seeds with a spoon. Make sure you don’t scrape all the way through to the backside or break the sides. I forgot to take a picture of the prepared zucchini this time after I rubbed them with olive oil and seasoned them, so I may or may not have stolen a picture from one of my other recipes, haha!
For these zucchini boats, I ran out of space for the 10th one, so I chopped it up and used it as filler, haha! If you have space for it in your casserole dish, awesome, fill ‘er up!
Mushroom Meat Mixture
While you’re par-cooking the zucchini in the oven, you’re going to make the filling for the zucchini boats.
The filling consists of ground beef, onion, garlic, the magical sauce that really gives it the taste of a true mushroom swiss burger, and rice. Now, if you’re trying to make this a lower-carb recipe, you could absolutely substitute the rice for cauliflower rice. In this house though, regular ole’ jasmine rice was used.
Let’s talk about the sauce… I wanted the flavor of the filling to really pop so that these weren’t super bland and so that this actually tasted like a burger. To give the filling that “oomph” factor, I added a small amount of soy sauce, worcestershire sauce, and dijon mustard in addition to seasoning everything with garlic salt and pepper. The flavor was bang on.
Stuffing the Zucchini Boats
After the zucchini has par-cooked in the oven, you’re going to fill it with the mushroom-meat mixture. There might be some of the filling leftover, which is fine! It’s delicious by itself on the side of the zucchini. For us, it was easier to give our 16 month old the filling by itself, so it was nice that there was some leftover. If you don’t want as much leftover, you can easily scale down or even just leave out the rice or some of the ground beef.
For the boats, after you stuff them with the filling, you’re going to use 1/2 of a slice of swiss on each one. You can totally use more if you want! To be honest, I would’ve used more, but I forgot the sliced swiss was for a recipe. So this was what we had on hand after I ate part of it, haha! After assembling the zucchini boats, they’re going to go back into the oven.
Sauteed Shrooms and Final Product!
At this time, you’re going to use the remaining mushrooms to saute them as a topper for the zucchini. This step is totally optional, but I find really adds to the flavor.
As you can see, I used a fairly big pan. This is so that the mushrooms wouldn’t be super over-crowded which allowed them to brown up evenly.
After the zucchini cooks through and is fork-tender, you’re going to top them with the sauteed mushrooms. Then, voila! That’s all there is to it!
These were a pretty easy and satisfying lunch, but would also be delicious for dinner. They also re-heated nicely! If you like what you see, please feel free to check out my other recipes here. For more zucchini boat recipes, check out the links I posted above! Please feel free to subscribe or leave any comments below to let me know what you think. Thanks!
Mushroom Swiss Burger Zucchini Boats
Equipment
- 13×15 casserole dish
Ingredients
- 5 medium zucchini, trimmed, cut in half, seeds scooped out Should be in the shape of a boat.
- 2 tbsp olive oil, divided
- salt and pepper, to taste
- 1 lb lean ground beef I used 90%
- 1 small onion, diced
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 8 oz baby bella mushrooms, sliced thinly, divided
- 1 tbsp soy sauce
- 2 tbsp worcestershire sauce, divided
- 2 tsp dijon mustard
- 1 1/2 cup cooked rice Cauli-rice can be used for a keto substitute
- 5 slices swiss cheese Can use more cheese if desired!
- 2 tbsp butter
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375°F
- Arrange prepared zucchini in 13×15 inch casserole dish. Rub all of the zucchini halves all over using half of the olive oil. Sprinkle each half with salt and pepper, to taste. Bake for 10 minutes. Set aside.
- While zucchini is par-cooking, heat remaining oil over medium-high heat in a large skillet with deep sides. Brown the ground beef, seasoning with salt and pepper. Once mostly browned, after about 5 minutes, add onion, garlic, and half of the mushrooms. Cook until the mushrooms and onions are just starting to become softened, approximately another 5 minutes.
- Add soy sauce, half of the worcestershire sauce, all of the dijon, and another pinch of salt and pepper. Mix well. Add rice, stirring to combine with meat, veggies and sauce. Simmer for 5 minutes.
- Add meat mixture to zucchini boats. Top each boat with 1/2 of a slice of swiss. Bake 10-12 minutes or until zucchini is fork-tender and cheese is melted. Wipe out the pan used for the filling.
- While the zucchini boats finish cooking, melt butter in the same pan used for the meat and vegetable mixture over medium-high heat. Once melted, add remaining mushrooms to the pan, spreading out to avoid over-crowding. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and add remaining worcestershire sauce to the pan. Cook, stirring only occasionally until mushrooms are softened and browned, approximately 5-7 minutes.
- Top finished zucchini with sauteed mushrooms. Serve and enjoy!
Notes
- If you are looking for more of a lower-carb alternative, you could easily substitute cauliflower rice instead of Jasmine rice.
- There may be leftover filling. It’s delicious by itself, or if you don’t want leftover filling, you can use less meat or less rice.
- The sauteed mushrooms on top are purely optional, but add a lot of the “shroominess” to the zucchini boats.
- If you don’t have enough room for the 10th zucchini boat, chop it up and add it in with the meat mixture at the same time you add the onions, mushrooms and garlic.