Fried courgette flowers are a delicious finger food to be served at the table in these early spring days. You can stuff them in many ways and choose different types of batter.

The classic Roman recipe

To prepare the courgette flowers in the Roman style, first wash the flower thoroughly and dry it gently so as not to break it. Fill it with mozzarella and anchovies, after having deprived it of the pistil and pass it in a star made of flour water. To prepare it, just mix a spoonful of flour and a glass and a half of cold water, slowly adding more flour and more water until reaching the perfect consistency, neither too thick nor too liquid.
To close the flowers, join the ends of all the petals and weld them around to prevent the fillings from coming out.
After passing the flowers in the batter, drain them to remove the excess and fry them in boiling seed oil. They must be salted and eaten immediately otherwise they lose their crunchiness.

Variants for the batter

You can prepare a soft and slightly leavened batter by dissolving 15 g of fresh brewer's yeast in a little sparkling water. Separately mix 150 g of 00 flour with 200 ml of sparkling water and add the yeast. Complete with a pinch of salt.
For a super crunchy batter you can replace 00 flour with rice flour and if you want a batter similar to that of Japanese tempera, mix an egg yolk with 100 gr of 00 flour and 200 ml of sparkling ice water.

Variants for the filling of courgette flowers

Do you want to prepare vegetarian fried courgette flowers? Fill them with mozzarella and dried tomatoes in oil or with steamed and mashed potatoes and green beans creating a sort of cream. Also add some pesto if you like.
If you have stale bread, instead, use the chopped crumb with an egg, basil and Parmesan to fill the flowers. A creative and very tasty recycling!
For a non-vegetarian and very tasty variant, replace the classic anchovies with cold cuts such as speck or mortadella.
As for the choice of cheeses, however, you can replace the mozzarella with a scamorza or with ricotta. Always take care that the filling is not excessively soft and creamy, because during cooking it may come out.