Chocolate Zucchini Bread Tested Recipe

Chocolate Zucchini Bread Recipe

Everything 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.

Chocolate Zucchini Bread: 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.

References:

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.

Stewart, Martha. Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook. Clarkson Potter/Publishers. New York: 2005.