Blossom’s Zucchini Napoleon

Ronen Seri, owner of NYC’s Blossom, is a Jerusalemite by birth. His zucchini napoleon is a simple and wonderful dish made by grilling tomatoes and zucchini and using pesto as ‘mortar’; if you can find heirloom tomatoes, the flavor will be even better.
New paragraph… Image by Alex Etling / A.ETLING photography
This simple and wonderful seasonal dish came together while I was visiting a friend in East Hampton, New York. Driving back from the beach, I picked up fresh vegetables at an organic farm stand in Sagaponack. As I unpacked the most beautiful zucchini and tomatoes I had ever seen, my chef friend joked that we should make a tower out of the vegetables. We grilled the tomatoes and zucchini, and using pesto as our “mortar,” created our Zucchini Napoleon — a petite tower with giant taste! If you can and heirloom tomatoes, the flavor will be even better.
Serves 3 as a small appetizer
1 medium to large zucchini 1 large tomato
Salt and black pepper
3 tablespoons olive oil
½ cup Pistachio Pesto (recipe follows)
1) Cut the zucchini in half crosswise, then cut each half lengthwise into ¼-inch-thick slices. Slice the tomato into ¼-inch-thick slices, then halve the tomato slices. Sprinkle both sides of the zucchini and tomato slices with a pinch each of salt and pepper. Drizzle with 2 tablespoons of the olive oil.
2) In a large skillet, heat the remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the zucchini slices and sauté, dipping them as needed until they begin to brown on each side and become slightly soft. Remove the zucchini and set aside. Add the tomato slices to the pan and sauté for 1–2 minutes.
3) Spread a small amount of pesto on each plate, followed by a slice of zucchini, additional pesto and a slice of tomato. Repeat the layers to the desired height.
Pistachio Pesto
Makes about 2 cups
Pistachios were a staple in my home growing up, so much so that my grandfather used to have them shipped all the way from Turkey! Why not create a cream sauce with them? Blended pistachios have a consistency that can make a wonderful cream substitute. When we swapped out pine nuts for the pistachios, it created such a creamy consistency that there was no need for cheese in our pesto sauce. Try it with ravioli or your favorite pasta.
3 bunches fresh basil
½ cup raw unsalted pistachios
1 tablespoon chopped fresh garlic
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons salt
1) Bring a pot of water to a boil. Fill a medium bowl with ice and water and set it nearby. Blanch the basil leaves in the boiling water for 5–10 seconds to wilt them. Carefully remove the basil from the boiling water and submerge it in the ice water to stop the cooking process. Drain the basil, shaking off as much water as you can. Put the basil, garlic, pistachios, olive oil, salt and ½ cup water in a high-speed blender and blend until smooth.
Reprinted with permission from “The Blossom Cookbook: Classic Favorites From The Restaurant That Pioneered A New Vegan Cuisine” (Avery) by Ronen Seri and Pamela Elizabeth.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Most Popular
- 1
News A Jewish Republican and Muslim Democrat are suddenly in a tight race for a special seat in Congress
- 2
Fast Forward The NCAA men’s Final Four has 3 Jewish coaches
- 3
Film & TV What Gal Gadot has said about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- 4
Fast Forward Cory Booker proclaims, ‘Hineni’ — I am here — 19 hours into anti-Trump Senate speech
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Jerusalem Post editor Zvika Klein, arrested in ‘Qatar-gate,’ says he’s being unfairly prosecuted for his reporting
-
Fast Forward Trump fires national security officials, reportedly at urging of Laura Loomer, far-right Jewish ‘Islamophobe’
-
Fast Forward Display honoring Jewish women graduates of naval academy removed ahead of Hegseth visit
-
Yiddish טשיקאַוועסן: מיידעלע געפֿינט 3,800־יאָריקע קמיע לעבן בית־שמש, ישׂראלTIDBITS: Little girl finds 3,800-year old amulet near Beit Shemesh, Israel
אַן עקספּערט פֿון פֿאַרצײַטיקע קמיעות האָט באַשטעטיקט אַז די קמיע איז געלעגן אויפֿן אָרט פֿונעם אַמאָליקן לאַנד כּנען.
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.