I paid bills, finished watching the last movie I checked out from the library, got some coffee, and then made a batch of delicious zucchini bread! While I'm sitting here enjoying some, let me share my recipe with you. Serious yum here, folks! Everything you need to know is after the jump.
First off the bat, you can use either fresh *or* frozen (albeit defrosted! DO NOT put still-frozen zucchini in this!) zucchini. My parents' neighbors and friends had a bumper crop last summer, and I spent roughly a week chopping and shredding the bounty they shared with us. I froze most of it, which I recommend doing if you have a lot of zucchini. It doesn't take up much space in the freezer.
You take the shredded zucchini and place it in the middle of a clean tea towel or thin dishcloth. Bunch it up and squeeze the zucchini to get all of the water out! You'll need to do this for a bit, and you might have to adjust the cloth to move the zucchini to dry patches. Once the zucchini has been "drained," it's ready to be either used in a recipe or put into plastic freezer bags. I tend to put a cup's worth of zucchini in each bag, so it's easier to gauge how much you need at a glance. I will probably share more zucchini recipes once it's closer to summer, but the point of freezing things like this is so you can enjoy the veggies during fall and winter!
And secondly, this recipe makes enough for two loaves of bread. I've never been able to reduce it quite to my satisfaction, so I have left it as-is. But I promise that this is so good that you'll be glad you made two loaves at once!
The ingredients:
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 2 tsps cinnamon
- 1 tsp nutmeg
- 3 eggs
- 1/2 cup vegetable or canola oil
- 1/2 cup applesauce
- 1 1/4 to 2 1/4 cups sugar**
- 3 tsps vanilla extract
- 2 cups grated/shredded zucchini
- 1 cup chopped nuts (walnuts or pecans recommended)***
** Depending on how sweet you want the bread to be; I tend to go with less sugar.
*** I like putting chopped-up nuts in my zucchini bread, but it's not imperative. If you don't like nuts or are allergic, you can easily leave these out and the bread won't suffer.
What you'll need:
- An oven
- 2 8 x 4 inch loaf pans
- Baking spray (or cooking spray and some flour)
- Mixing spoon
- 2 mixing bowls, one medium and one large
- Measuring cups
- Measuring spoons
- You can use a hand mixer for this if you wish!
How to make it:
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Grease the loaf pans.
- Mix flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a medium bowl.
- Mix the eggs, oil, applesauce, vanilla, and sugar together in a large bowl. Add the dry ingredients and mix well. (The batter is going to be very thick at this point!)
- Stir in the zucchini and nuts (if using) and mix well. Divide the batter between the two pans.
- Bake for 45 to 55 minutes (ovens can vary) or until tester inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool in pan one wire rack for 20 minutes, then remove bread from pan and cool completely.
