Bangla-Flavored Fried Zucchini

One of our favorite dishes from Bangladesh is potol jal, Bengali for “fried potol.” Potols are called “pointed gourds” in English, patol in Hindi. They’re shaped like small fat cucumbers, with pointed ends, light and dark green lengthwise stripes, and large flat seeds. Since potols can be hard to find here in North America, we usually substitute zucchini; if you can find potols, do try them.

The cooking technique here is shallow frying, which gives