Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Zucchini is Delicious!

My neighbor has a much bigger garden than mine. Today she came over with this zucchini. (Pardon the quality, it was taken with my Blackberry. The glasses are there for size comparison. It was massive!)
She gently challenged me to make zucchini bread - she would make some and I would make some, and we would compare! (She had another of these giant zucchini with which to work.) Always game for a bake-off, I shredded the whole thing in my Cuisinart:
Um, that's a LOT of grated zucchini! (Turns out, by the way, enough for about 6-8 loaves of zucchini bread)

Super-Yummy Zucchini Bread
* 3 cups all-purpose flour
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1 teaspoon baking soda
* 1 teaspoon baking powder
* 3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
* 3 eggs
* 1/2 cup vegetable oil
* 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
* 1 1/2-2 cups white sugar (depends on how sweet you like things...I think the cinnamon-sugar topping and crust makes it really sweet.)
* 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
* 2 cups grated zucchini
* cinnamon and sugar for topping

1. Grease and cinnamon/sugar two 8 x 4 inch loaf pans. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
2. Sift flour, salt, baking powder, soda, and cinnamon together in a bowl.
3. Beat eggs, oil, applesauce, vanilla, and sugar together in a large bowl. Add sifted ingredients to the creamed mixture, and beat well. Stir in zucchini until well combined. Pour batter into prepared pans. Sprinkle cinnamon-sugar on top.
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.

This recipe totally freezes well. I will cut it up, wrap each slice in plastic wrap, put the pieces into a freezer bag, and freeze it. That way we can take out just one slice for a quick home-baked breakfast, snack, or lunchbox treat! If there's any left...



 
The proof is in the faces!
(Going back to the idea of the bake-off, my neighbor's zucchini bread was mighty tasty too. She made a recipe with sweet potatoes!)

And that's what works for me this week.

8 comments:

Leigh Ann said...

I bow to your innate domesticity. I would never bake were it not for my bread machine....just another crutch to get through working-mother-dom. :)

Anonymous said...

Judging from your kids' faces this cake is yummy. Will add it to my recipes and try it when I get back (by which time there should be zucchini in the garden).

Anonymous said...

Judging from your kids' faces this cake is yummy. Will add it to my recipes and try it when I get back (by which time there should be zucchini in the garden).

Jennifer said...

Someone just offered us some of the abundance of their zucchini crop. This sounds great!

Beth @ TheAngelForever said...

Love your recipe, looks a lot like the one we use. I think the best use for extra zucchini is to make lots of bread. We often put dried cranberries or raisins in to mix things up a bit.

Leora said...

Yum!

Heather said...

Looks delicious!! :)

Mama to Moons said...

Unfortunately, I can't eat zucchini, but this sounded like such a good recipe that when my friend posted "I need a good zucchini bread recipe" I immediately sent her the link to you're blog.

Here's here review: "This is an excellent zucchini bread recipe. I decreased the sugar to 1 cup and subbed pumpkin for the applesauce. YUM"

Thanks for sharing this.