Spring Garden Ricotta Pancakes

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 200 F and place a cooling rack inside a baking sheet. Line a colander or sieve with cheesecloth and place inside a large mixing bowl.
2. Using the grating disk of your food processor, shred the zucchini, asparagus and shallot. Note: I have never tried this with a box grater or mandolin, the asparagus might be quite difficult to grate by hand thinly enough so that it cooks completely in the pancake.
3. Place the grated vegetables in the cheesecloth-lined colander set inside the mixing bowl. Sprinkle with the teaspoon of salt and let drain for 30 minutes (don't skip this or your batter will be too loose and watery). After 30 minutes, give the vegetables a good squeeze inside the cheesecloth to expell any extra liquid.
4. In a large mixing bowl, combine the vegetables, lemon zest, a few good grinds of black pepper, the ricotta, egg, basil and chives. Mix thoroughly.
5. Sprinkle the flour and baking soda into the batter and stir just to combine (an additional TBS or two of flour can be added if the batter is at all runny).
6. Heat a small amount of canola oil in a nonstick pan, or griddle over medium high heat. When the pan is warm, drop and spread the batter into fairly thin pancakes (I use about 2 TBS of batter per pancake, which yields roughly 15 pancakes total).
7. Cook each pancake about 3-4 minutes per side - you want a nice golden brown color on each side. As you finish each pancake, serve immediately, or place on the cooling rack/baking sheet inside the warm oven. These are great drizzled with a little basil oil or with a dollop of herbed fresh ricotta.