In my opinion, no food is as summery as zucchini. For those who grow zucchini in their gardens, they have be creative to use up the amount of squash they harvest, share it with friends, or freeze it. Growing up, my next-door-neighbors planted a vegetable garden and left my mom in charge of tending it while they vacationed each summer. Each year they vacationed more and more, to the point where they started spending the entire summer away. That meant our family ate a lot of zucchini while they were gone!
My first memory of zucchini is a dish my mom made many years ago. We were at my grandma's house. I think it was right after my grandma moved from "The House on Monica Lane" to her condo. For dinner, she sautéed chicken breasts with onions and zucchini slices, added diced tomatoes and let it simmer. Before serving it, she sprinkled parmesan cheese over the top and covered the pan until the cheese melted. It was incredibly delicious and became a Mapes family staple. While we all liked the recipe, we couldn't rely on it as the sole meal for using up zucchini. My mom also made chocolate zucchini cake and butterscotch blondies with zucchini. I remember being skeptical and pleasantly surprised by both. The following summer, I started making chocolate zucchini cake a yearly tradition. I think I even made it for my birthday cake one year.
Last week I made zucchini butterscotch blondies. I'm going to play around with it a little bit and I'll share it if I can make the blondies more cookie-like and less cake-like. In the mean time, I decided to make chocolate zucchini cake. I didn't want to use the recipe from my youth because it has cinnamon in it and I'm not crazy about cinnamon in baked goods (except in cinnamon rolls). After a lot of Google image searching, I decided to make a recipe from The Cutting Edge of Ordinary because I liked the look of the crumb. I made my version in a smaller pan, reduced the sugar an increased the zucchini. I was thrilled with the results! Saturday morning couldn't have been much better spent, eating chocolate zucchini cake and rescuing this adorable baby bunny who got stuck in a hole outside of my apartment:
Objective
Find a new recipe for chocolate zucchini cake that doesn't use cinnamon.
Materials
1 cup + 2 tablespoons flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder (not Dutch-processed)
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup granulated sugar
4 Tablespoons butter, softened
1/4 cup olive oil
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup milk (or buttermilk, if you have it on hand)
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 1/4 cup zucchini, grated (about 1 medium zucchini)
3/4 cup chocolate chips (I prefer semi-sweet)
Methods
1. Preheat the oven to 325°. Grease an 8x8" dish and set aside.
2. Stir together the milk and lemon juice. Set aside. *Omit this step if you have buttermilk, but it's not worth buying a container specifically for this recipe since it only requires 1/4 cup.
3. Sift the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt into a small/medium sized bowl. Set aside.
4. Beat sugar, butter and olive oil until well-mixed.
5. Beat in the egg and vanilla.
6. Alternatively add the sifted dry ingredients and the milk/buttermilk in three separate additions.
7. Fold in the zucchini and about half of the chocolate chips.
8. Pour into the prepared 8x8" dish. Smooth the top and sprinkle with the remaining chocolate chips (if you don't think there are enough on top, add more).
9. Bake at 325° for 45-50 minutes or until the top springs back when pressed lightly/a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
10. Cool completely before covering. **I know it's hard, but if you can, wait 24-48 hours before cutting into the cake. The zucchini will release moisture over time, and the cake will be perfectly moist at around 48 hours. It's worth the wait, I promise!
Results
Delicious as is. Needs no frosting or ice cream on the side. I made it Thursday night, tried it Friday night but found that it was even better on Saturday. Incredibly moist and delicious. The moisture helped the chocolate chips stay soft, which improved the texture of the cake.
Discussion and Future Directions
This will be my go-to chocolate zucchini cake recipe from here on out (unless my mom specifically requests her recipe)! If I doubled this recipe and baked the cake in a 9x13, I would omit at least 1/4 cup of the sugar, but omitting even more would be ok. Reducing the sugar helps make it more of a snack cake, rather than a dessert. I promise it's a good idea because there is no way you won't keep going back to the kitchen for "just one more little piece." Plus, it has vegetables in it, so it's healthy, right? Next time you have zucchini, give it a try!
Supplementary Materials
More bunny pictures because he's just so adorable!!
