Soak the sundried tomatoes and date(s) in enough water to cover them. Set aside while you prepare your zucchini. Cold water is fine, but warm water will soften them faster. Soaking not only softens the tomatoes and dates so they blend easier (and don't burnout your food processor/blender), but it creates a wonderfully flavorful liquid that enhances the sauce.

Sometimes zucchini peels can be bitter so I recommend peeling them if serving to children (or husbands!). Spiralize your zucchini to make spaghetti noodles.

If you don't have a spiral slicer you can use a standard vegetable peeler to make fettuccine noodles. Just peel the zucchini like you normally would. After you remove all the green skin, just keep going. Turn the zucchini frequently to keep the noodles from getting too wide. Stop when you get to the seeds in the center. That part doesn't make very good noodles. Snack on that part as you prepare dinner or use it to sample your sauce as you make it!

Optional:Sprinkle the noodles with a generous pinch or two of salt and toss to coat. This will draw some of the moisture out of the noodles and make them more "al dente" and a little less zucchini-ish. Allow to sit for 10-15 minutes or more then drain off the water before serving. If you like, you can rinse them to remove the salt then dry them in a salad spinner. I just adjust the amount of salt in the sauce.

Combine all sauce ingredients including the 1/2 cup soaking water in a high-speed blender and blend to combine. Add more water, 2 tablespoons at a time, as needed to help blend smoothly. The sauce should be thick.

After blending the sauce on the Whole Foods setting of my blendtec blender to make it smooth, I blended again using the Soup setting to gently heat the sauce.

In a large bowl, toss the zucchini noodles with the marinara sauce. Serve immediately.

If you won't be eating all the spaghetti at once, refrigerate the noodles and sauce separately. If you mix them together the zucchini will release its juice and thin the sauce.

I found the sauce to be a little too salty. I don't know if I accidentally used 1/2 TABLESPOON of salt instead of 1/2 teaspoon (not that *I'd* ever do anything like that!) or if it just needs adjusting. To salvage the sauce I added a little turbinado sugar (a minimally processed sugar) since sweet balances salty. Worked perfectly! Next time I'll start with 1/4 teaspoon salt and add from there.

If you have all your ingredients at room temperature when you start, blending will warm the sauce, especially if you have a high speed blender. Use the Soup setting on a Blendtec, or blend for 90 seconds to two minutes. My zucchini were fresh out of the refrigerator so even though I warmed my sauce on the Soup setting, the noodles quickly cooled it. I wanted my spaghetti warmer, but didn't want to cook it. I wanted to preserve all the raw goodness, like enzymes, that can be destroyed by heat. So I put both the noodles and the sauce in the oven. I warmed the oven to just over 100 degrees then turned it off. I left the noodles and sauce in there for 20-30 minutes to warm up. You could do this in a dehydrator if you have one. You can also do this to warm up left overs. Just warm the noodles and sauce separately because the noodles will release juice as they warm. Be careful not to heat them too much or they'll get soggy.