Zucchini rice with apricot and walnut

The zucchini rice with apricot and walnut is quick and easy to prepare and is very healthy.

Nutrient profile: According to GDA guidelines, one portion of this low-calorie recipe covers around 100% of the average daily requirement of manganese. Manganese plays a role in the formation of cartilage tissue, among other things. In addition, this dish contains a good ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids at 4:1, thus meeting the recommended maximum ratio of 5:1.
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During the cooking process, some of the heat-sensitive ingredients are lost, which slightly reduces the amount per portion.

Brown rice: Wholegrain rice or brown rice retains its natural silver skin after harvesting. This means that wholegrain rice is more nutritious than regular rice: the vitamins and minerals stay on the grain. Wholegrain rice tastes slightly nutty and keeps you full for a long time.

Zucchini: Zucchini is versatile in terms of its uses (it can also be eaten raw). In addition to the classic green zucchini, yellow zucchini is also increasingly available. However, they taste almost identical. Zucchini is easy to digest, low in calories and rich in vitamins.

Dried apricots: The vitamin and nutrient content of dried apricots is almost five times higher than that of fresh apricots in terms of weight due to water loss.

Walnut: The real walnut, also called tree nut, has the highest content of alpha-linolenic acid (an omega-3 fatty acid that is healthy for the heart) of all nuts. It is also rich in vitamin E, zinc (an important trace element, for the liver and hair, among other things) and potassium (for the heart muscle, among other things).

Cumin: Due to the similar name, there is often confusion between cumin (Cumin, Cuminum cyminum) and caraway ( Carum carvi). However, they are not closely related and also differ greatly in taste. Cumin is often used in Indian, Turkish and Greek cuisine.

Cardamom: Cardamom, which comes from India, is not only a very old spice, but is also one of the most expensive of its kind, along with vanilla and saffron threads. A distinction is made between black cardamom ( Amomum subulatum), which is generally used for preparing hearty and spicy dishes due to its bitter and earthy aroma, and green cardamom ( Elettaria cardamomum), which is mainly used as an ingredient in spice mixtures and desserts due to its sweet and spicy aroma. We used green cardamom for this dish.

Dried fruit is often sulphurised: Treating dried fruit with sulphur dioxide has two advantages for large-scale industrial producers: firstly, the sulphur coating helps prevent rotting, as it inhibits the metabolism of many microorganisms and thus improves the shelf life of the product; secondly, it preserves the colour of the fruit. The latter is achieved, among other things, by sulphur's ability to inhibit oxidation-promoting enzymes. Although this makes the fruit more visually attractive for many customers, we generally advise against sulphurised dried fruit. There are several reasons for this: the preservation process destroys some vitamins, such as folic acid, and sulphur can also have an irritating effect on asthmatics and allergy sufferers.

Reduce sulphur: Since, depending on legal regulations, ingredients present in small quantities do not require a separate declaration, for example added sulphur under 10 mg/kg of dried fruit, you can wash the dried fruit under hot water if in doubt. This will remove at least some of the added sulphur.

If you don't want to do without oil completely, you can use refined rapeseed oil for sautéing in the third step of the recipe.