Last week, into my home came a zucchini the size of a football. While I love the stuff, my husband hates it. Loathes it, in fact. And just as I was dreaming up creative ways to use it — should I stuff a chicken? core it and bake it like a boat with a cargo of meats and marinara? — out fell one of those food-zine newspaper inserts.
What initially caught my eye was a recipe for watermelon gazpacho with herb oil (which I vow to try despite the disgusted looks I get when I string together “watermelon” and “gazpacho” in a sentence). But as I flipped through it, Ii found their zucchini special and a recipe for that standard zucchini overabundance user upper ubiquitous to potlucks and garden gatherings everywhere.
Everyone has their own zucchini bread recipe, each with slight variations, nuts, other fruits, different portions of this and that.
I’ve made zucchini bread before, but it was a long time ago and it came out way too bitter. But I’ve had some good zucchini bread courtesy of our arts and entertainment reporter, and figured I’d give it another try. The magazine’s recipe looked pretty simple and pulled in plenty of sugar.
I made it twice, turning the second batch into muffins (which I cooked for 25 minutes instead of the load time of 1 hour). It turned out cakey and moist and sugary, so here, tested and approved, it is to share.
What’s your favorite zucchini (or other vegetable) bread recipe?
Zucchini Bread
from Relish
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 1/4 cups sugar
3 eggs, beaten
1 3/4 cups shredded, unpeeled zucchini undrained
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Preheat oven to 325-degres. Spray a 9X5 loaf pan with cooking spray and dust with flour.
Combine oil, sugar, eggs and zucchini in a large bowl. In a seperate bowl, combine remaining ingredients. Gradually add to zucchini mix. Beat 3 minutes with a mixer on medium speed. Scrape batter into a prepared pan.
Bake 1 hour or until inserted knife comes out clean. Serves 10.
The Relish link above has calorie and nutritional information.
I think I’ve made 16 loaves of zucchini bread so far this summer! This is a great recipe that I found on-line. It makes two 4″x8″ loaves.
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/moms-zucchini-bread/reviews.aspx
MOM’S ZUCCHINI BREAD
Ingredients:
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3 eggs
1 cup vegetable oil
2 1/4 cups white sugar
3 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups grated zucchini
1 cup chopped walnuts
Directions:
1. Grease and flour two 8 x 4 inch pans. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Sift flour, salt, baking powder, soda, and cinnamon together in a bowl.
3. Beat eggs, oil, vanilla, and sugar together in a large bowl. Add sifted ingredients to the creamed mixture, and beat well. Stir in zucchini and nuts until well combined. Pour batter into prepared pans.
4. Bake for 40 to 60 minutes, or until tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan on rack for 20 minutes. Remove bread from pan, and completely cool.
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I’ve modified this recipe several different ways:
1) added 2 cups of mini chocolate chips (ho-hum)
2) added 2 cups of raisins (yummy)
3) added a combo of 1 cup raisins and a 2 cups of dried cranberry & spiced apple mix (very yummy)
4) added 1 cup shredded coconut, a small can of crushed pineapple and chopped macadamia nuts (also very yummy – I might use a larger can of pineapple next time or try chunks instead of crushed).
When adding these extra ingredients, I increased the baking time to 60-70 minutes – the old “til a toothpick comes out clean” test works great.
I also made some honey butter to go with the bread – I mixed 1-1/2 cups softened unsalted butter (3 sticks) with 1/2 cup of honey; mix with an electric mixer til well blended.
I, too, had zucchinis to use up, so I tried your recipe. I wasn’t sure how I’d like it, but it is delicious! Thanks for sharing.
PS make sure to read your farm newsletter this week. Breaking news 🙂