We have declared… a goof off day. D. skipped a class, and stayed in bed with the heater on until the house warmed up, T. happily watched kids’ TV and concurrently read a book. It’s cold, and elsewhere it’s almost Thanksgiving, and some days, you’ve just got to veg.
Remember that big zucchini I mentioned? And my friend Alkelda’s gift of chocolate ginger candy bars that I used in my cookies? Together they made an amazingly tasty chocolate chip zucchini bread. Zucchini bread — when you’re using fresh zucchini and not dried — is a bread that can easily be too moist, so my recipe uses little excess liquid. If you use eggs instead of flax as a binder, you do have some moisture, but don’t worry if it seems a little dry — when zucchini cooks, it gives up all moisture, and leaves behind little dark green ribbons of color in your bread. (This is adapted from Bread for Breakfast, By Beth Hensperger & Leigh Beisch © 2001, Ten Speed Press)
- 3 c. AP flour
- 1/4 tsp. baking soda
- 1 Tbsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1 Tbsp. freshly ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp. allspice
- 3 large eggs OR 1/4 c. ground flax (+ 1/2 c. water, for flax)
- 1/4 c. applesauce
- 1/3 c. oil
- 1 c. brown sugar, firmly packed
- 2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 2 1/2 c. shredded zucchini
- 2 chocolate bars, chopped, OR 1 c. chocolate chips
- Prepare two loaf pans, and preheat oven to 325°F/163°C
- In a medium sized bowl, sift together the first six ingredients, seven if you’re going to use flax.
- Once you have your dry ingredients combined, in a separate bowl, cream together your oil, sugar and vanilla and applesauce (and the eggs, if you’re using them). Fold in the zucchini, and the chocolate chips. Add your dry ingredients to your wet, making sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl to make sure that everything is thoroughly combined — it’s just so much more work to do this step the wrong way around, and if you overstir your bread, more gluten will form than you might want, making it less muffin-crumbly, and more firm, so be aware of that!
- Divide your batter evenly into your two oiled pans, and bake for an hour on your lowest rack. Do the toothpick test fifty-five minutes in, to make sure you’re on the right track.
There is every chance that your bread won’t be this crumbly; having to turn the loaves and otherwise fuss with this !#@$!*&%*&@# oven means that mine didn’t cook as evenly as it should have; the interior was more moist than it should have been while the edges were more dry. However, the results were whisked out of the house to the Arts Department; the secretary, who squirreled away the leftovers, remarked that I was indeed “a good woman.” Which is high praise indeed.
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Indeed you are!