Kitchen3N

Recipes and food fun from Apt 3N

Chocolate Zucchini Bread

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There is no rhyme or reason to this cake. It is neither healthy, nor a proper dessert. It is simply for chocolate lovers. It is a glorious use of a bland, high water content vegetable that lends it’s moisture to the crumb of this perfect snack cake. It’s blandness acts as a perfect palette for all the wonderful cocoa and brown sugar flavor to absorb.
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I’ve posted about chocolate zucchini cake before. This bread version is a bit heartier with whole wheat flour and almond flour – a little more substance to justify my classification of it as a snacking cake! I wasn’t happy with any of the recipes I found online for chocolate zucchini loaf, so I made my tweaks, including adding chocolate chips, and voila! Perfection.

Ingredients

  • 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour (or 1 cup AP flour/1 cup whole wheat flour, 1/2 cup almond flour)
  • 1/2 cup dutch processed cocoa plus extra for coating chocolate chips(if using natural cocoa, swap the amounts of baking soda and baking powder)
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 12 tbsp melted butter
  • 1 lb zucchini, grated
  • 1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Butter and lightly dust a 9inx5in loaf pan with cocoa powder. Stick in the freezer while preparing your ingredients.
  2. Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat. Turn off heat and allow to cool down.
  3. Wash and cut off one end of zucchini. Grate, not completely finely, but not in huge slivers either. Place a large sieve over a bowl and place grated zucchini there to drain while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.
  4. Combine all the dry ingredients in a large bowl (everything except the eggs, butter and chocolate chips). Whisk to combine, breaking up any large clumps. Make a well in the center and add eggs and butter. Mix with a wooden spoon (Bengali alert: I used my hands to mix this batter!). Add all of the zucchini and stir until combined. In a small bowl combine the chocolate chips with sprinkling of cocoa (maybe 1/4tsp).  Toss to coat the chocolate chips with the cocoa. Add to the batter, gently folding in. Take the loaf pan out of the freezer and add the batter, spreading evenly across the loaf pan. Bake in preheated oven for 1 hour 10 minutes or until a toothpick comes out relatively clean.*
  5. Allow to cool completely before attempting to remove it from the pan.

*It won’t come out completely clean due to the moisture of this loaf. A few crumbs are ok. You just don’t want it to come out with wet batter.

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

IMG_4847I was incredulous the first time I heard the words “Zucchini Bread” at my adopted Jewish grandmother’s apartment some 15 years ago. Her name is Sophie and she was my mother’s confidant, advisor, protector and friend for many years. She taught her the value of saving. She raised two children during the Depression. She told my mother, every week she set aside $0.50. She grew such a small sum into stake in a multi-million dollar company and a condo in a luxury apartment building in downtown Manhattan. IMG_4854So when she talked, we listened:

  • “Eat Romaine lettuce, not iceberg. It’s all water.”
  • “Ya ever tried zucchini bread? It’s delicious.”
  • “Take care of ya mother. She works hard.”

Right on all counts. Take it one step further with chocolate zucchini cake. I was skeptical when a mom brought zucchini brownies to a play date. But it had such deep chocolate flavor! And it was moist! And magical! I realize that zucchini’s blandness kind of works in its favor in baked goods. Between that and the water content, it’s the perfect vessel for delivering a rich, moist, chocolate crumb. I was nervous as I folded the 3 cups into the batter, that those eating the cake would see slivers of green running throughout, but it melted right into the cake. And with that much veg content, you don’t feel like the world’s worst parent when your kid (and husband) reaches for it throughout the day.

Adapted barely from King Arthur Flour.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter (1 stick) at room temperature
  • 1/2 cup vegetable oil
  • 1 3/4 cups sugar
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt (next time I would try increasing this to 1 tsp!)
  • 1/2 cup buttermilk, sour cream, or yogurt (I used buttermilk)
  • 2 1/2  cups all purpose flour
  • 3/4 cup Dutch process cocoa*
  • 3 cups shredded zucchini
  • 1 cup chocolate chips
  • 1 cup heavy cream

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Grease a 9″x13″ baking pan.
  2. Sift flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt into a large bowl. Stir gently to combine.
  3. In a stand mixer or in a large bowl with a handheld electric mixer, beat butter at medium high speed until light and airy – about 1 minute. Lower the speed to medium low and gradually add half the sugar, then oil, then remaining sugar. Add vanilla, then eggs, one at a time, until incorporated fully. Stop to scrape down the bowl. Turn on the mixer briefly once more to incorporate everything.
  4. At low speed, add half of the flour/cocoa mixture. Then slowly pour in the buttermilk (or sour cream or yogurt). Add the rest of the dry ingredients.
  5. Remove bowl from stand mixer and fold in the zucchini with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon. When fully incorporated, pour into greased pan and bake for 40-45 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Let cool.
  6. Heat heavy cream in a saucepan until scalding hot (bubbles appear around the perimeter). Pour over the chocolate chips and stir until it becomes a spreadable ganache. Pour and spread evenly over cooled cake.

*Dutch process cocoa, though harder to find, is essential for that deep chocolate flavor. When you use a quality cocoa powder, it makes all the difference between a standard chocolate cake and a gourmet one. Can be purchased online.

Lemon Yogurt Cake

IMG_2645Is your fridge forever cluttered? If so,  you can empathize when I say I made this cake for the sole purpose of clearing out a container of yogurt. I’ve been using yogurt quite a bit in lieu of buttermilk for our morning pancakes. Just sub it in your favorite buttermilk pancake recipe, thin it out with some water or milk, and it is just as good!  IMG_2625Inaya is my go to person for sifting dry ingredients together. She can almost mix wet batter, but needs a little help reining in her stirring excitement. Kudos to her since I am not easy to work with in the kitchen. Any one of my friends who have attempted to cook or bake with me only to run out screaming and flailing their arms can attest to that. IMG_2632 Sorry for the sofa/printer pictured here. It’s hard to find good lighting in my apartment and it just so happens that smack in the middle of the living room is the best place. IMG_2633 There’s no butter in this cake. And I can’t say that I don’t miss it. I do. Sincerely. But, luckily, I am taking this over to my in-laws tomorrow, where there is a sort of hex on butter (I know, I know how could we be so different, might as well be from another planet). But there is no denying that some of the best cakes are made with vegetable oil. Namely because veg oil is a liquid at room temperature, so cakes made with it tend to be more moist. Take Beatty’s Chocolate Cake from example. And make no mistake – this is yet another Ina recipe, adapted a bit, which she adapted a bit from Dorie Greenspan. IMG_2637 This cake gets a few hits of lemon flavor. First, the lemon zest infuses the batter. Second, it gets drenched in a lemon/sugar syrup while still warm. Third, it gets a pretty little glaze from a powdered sugar/lemon juice concoction. IMG_2638 I used large eggs instead of the extra large eggs she usually calls for. Didn’t miss a thing. I might try a mixture of baking powder/baking soda next time though, just to see how it affects the rise. Also, I omitted the vanilla extract, which I sincerely regret. IMG_2640  I also used 1/3 cup powdered sugar for the icing rather than a full cup (we’re watching our waist lines around here LOL). IMG_2651So, if you know of any butter haters, this is the cake to make for them.

Adapted from Ina Garten.

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp kosher salt
  • 1/2 cup vegetable oil
  • 1 cup full fat plain yogurt
  • 2 tsp lemon zest (from 2 big lemons or 3 small ones)
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 3 large eggs
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1/3 cup lemon juice
  • another 1/3 cup sugar
  • additional 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 1/3 cup powdered sugar (more if that’s your thing)

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Line the bottom of a loaf pan with parchment paper and spray with non stick spray.
  2. Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt into a medium bowl. Mix oil, yogurt, lemon zest and vanilla in a large measuring cup or mixing bowl. Add eggs, sugar and stir vigorously until incorporated. Add the wet ingredients to the dry. Don’t over mix – a few lumps are OK. Pour batter into greased pan and bake for 50 minutes.
  3. After the cake is done, let it sit 10 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack. Place the cake and rack over a sheet pan (to catch excess syrup/icing). Dissolve water and sugar in a sauce pan. Poke holes through the top of the cake with a toothpick and drizzle the lemon syrup.
  4. Combine lemon juice and powdered sugar until smooth. Drizzle over the top of the cake. Slice. Serve.