verything
seems to taste better when chocolate is added to it. Take this recipe for
Chocolate Zucchini Bread. It came about when I had a glut of zucchini one
summer. Since I love zucchini bread my first instinct was to make the
zucchini bread recipe on the site. But after making a couple of loaves,
and still having a few zucchini to use up, my thoughts turned to
chocolate.
It wasn't long before I was combing through baking books looking for
ideas. What I found was that all the chocolate zucchini bread recipes I
looked at used
cocoa powder. So, with this in mind I tinkered with the zucchini bread
recipe on the site, first replacing some of the all-purpose flour with
unsweetened cocoa powder, not Dutch-processed, as I wanted a deep
chocolate color and flavor. Next, I upped the amount
of grated zucchini, leaving out the grated apple. I decided to also leave out
the nuts and coconut called for in the original recipe, instead adding a
handful of semisweet chocolate chips. When I pulled this bread out of the
oven I was not disappointed. It tastes and smells of chocolate with just a hint of
cinnamon and allspice. And its moist texture will keep it fresh for days.
In fact, this bread was so good that I won't just make it in the summer
from home grown zucchini. Store bought will do me just fine.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
F (180 degrees C) and place rack in the center of the oven. Grease (or spray with
a nonstick vegetable spray) a 9 x 5 x 3 inch (23 x 13 x 8 cm) loaf pan. Set aside.
Grate
the zucchini, using a medium sized grater. Set aside.
In a large bowl whisk together the
flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, salt, ground cinnamon, and
ground allspice. Set
aside.
In the bowl of your electric
mixer (or with a hand mixer), beat the oil,
sugars, eggs, and vanilla extract until well blended (about 2 minutes). Fold
in the grated zucchini.
Add the flour mixture, beating just until combined. Then
fold in the chocolate chips.
Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and bake until the bread has risen and
a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 55 to 65 minutes.
Place on a wire rack to cool for about 10 minutes, then remove the bread from
the pan and cool completely.
Makes one - 9 x 5 x 3 inch
loaf.
Sources:
Anderson, Jean.
The American Century Cookbook. Clarkson/Potter Publishers. New York: 1997.
Lovegren, Sylvia.
Fashionable Food. MacMillan. New York: 1995.
Pence, Caprial and
Carey, Melissa. Caprial's Desserts. Ten Speed Press. Berkeley. 2001.
All content on this site is
either original or has been significantly modified and changed from its
credited original source. Use of materials on Joyofbaking.com is
entirely at the risk of the user and Joyofbaking.com or Stephanie Jaworski
will not be responsible for any damages directly or indirectly resulting
from the use.
This
website and the contents thereof are not endorsed or sponsored by the owner
of the "Joy of Cooking" series of books or its publisher Simon & Schuster,
Inc.
Content in any form may
not be copied or used without written permission of Stephanie Jaworski,
Joyofbaking.com. Students and non profit educators may use content without
permission with proper credit.
Page loading ... Please wait.
