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Food on Fridays Participants
Food on Fridays with Ann
When we planted our garden, we put in three zucchini plants.
“I can’t wait to eat zucchini bread!” my son exclaimed. “I looooooove zucchini bread.”
That was back in May. When we would go out to weed or water the garden, he’d ask if the zucchini was ready.
“Not yet,” I’d reply.
“Awwww….I was hoping we could make zucchini bread.”
“We have to wait until we get a bunch of them,” I said, “or a couple of big ones.”
I sent out my son with peelings and egg shells for the compost. “Do we have any zucchini?” I asked.
“Nope,” he replied. “I looked. Not yet.”
The other day I was invited to Charity’s house for tea. But she didn’t serve just tea. She made brownies, as well.
Zucchini brownies!
They were fantastic! I eagerly and shamelessly accepting a second piece when she offered!
I told her that my son often asked if the zucchini was ready, but we got our garden in late and so…no zucchini. In fact, I told her I’d seen blooms but no fruit, so I wondered if they needed pollination. She described how she successfully pollinated hers the year before. I thought about enlisting the help of my science-minded daughter for that task.
“For now, I have more than enough to share,” Charity said, “so I’ll send some home with you and you can make zucchini bread with your son.”
What a fantastic offer: I’d be bringing home zucchini for my little boy.
After the brownies, we got involved in discussions about blogging and art. We forgot all about the zucchini. I left without it.
Fortunately we saw each other a couple of days later, and fortunately Charity kindly remembered the zucchini.
What’s more, the very next day I discovered our first zucchini of the season, ripe and ready for picking. Right there in our garden!
Suddenly, we were awash in zucchini (cucumber, too, but that’s another post)!
So I set my son to work making the zucchini bread. He said he wants to be a great cook, so we decided he should learn to make the things he likes, to share them with his friends.
He followed this recipe, underlining where he was and checking off what he’d done:
I pulled down some of the ingredients for him, but my son did it all himself…everything except pouring it into the pans.
He even handled cleanup, which is important for a beginning cook to learn.
And the breads turned out great.
He was only interested in learning to make zucchini bread, not the brownies.
But I was interested in making Charity’s brownies.
The batter looked kind of weird and wormy at this point, with the shredded zucchini mixed into the batter. My picky-eater daughter refused to touch it.
For some reason it looked better when spread into the pan.
I snapped a picture after it was baked. It’s no thing of beauty, but boy was it moist, rich and fudge-like.
We’ll be making these recipes again, not only because we’re about to be inundated with zucchini, but also because they were delicious.
Charity’s Zucchini Brownies
From Simply in Season
- 1 cup flour
- ¾ cup whole wheat flour
- 1/3 cup baking cocoa
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
Combine in a large bowl.
2-3 cups zucchini (shredded)
Stir in.
- 1 egg
- ¾ cup sugar
- ¾ cup brown sugar
- ½ cup plain yogurt
- ½ cup oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Combine in separate bowl and beat with fork. Stir into zucchini mixture. Spread evenly into greased 9×13 inch pan.
- ½-1 cup semisweet or mint chocolate chips (Ann’s note: I used semisweet and mixed them in instead of spreading on top)
- ½ cup nuts (chopped; optional)
Sprinkle on top of batter. Bake in preheated oven at 350F until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, 35-40 minutes.
NOTE: I (Charity) used yellow squash instead of zucchini. I stirred in a whole bag (12 oz) of chocolate chips rather than pouring on top. Also, I had to bake for close to 45 minutes.
My Son’s Zucchini Chocolate Chip Bread
- 3 c. flour
- 1/2 c. white sugar
- 1 c. brown sugar
- 1 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- 1 tsp. cinnamon
- 3 eggs
- 2 c. grated zucchini, unpared
- 3/4 c. oil
- 3 tsp. vanilla
- 1/2 c. chopped walnuts (we left out the nuts)
- 6 oz. chocolate chips
Mix all dry ingredients together; then mix eggs, oil, vanilla and zucchini in a large bowl. Add dry ingredients to wet mixture and mix well. Add nuts and chocolate chips.
Grease pans. This batter can be poured into 2 loaf pans or 4 to 5 mini loaf pans, or into muffin pans (about 24). Bake at 350 degrees. Large loaves take about 50 to 60 minutes; mini-loaves about 30 minutes; and muffins about 15 to 20 minutes.
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Hi Annie Bananni!!! Missed you for a few weeks due to traveling and I do hope you are well and so is the family and you are enjoying a wonderful summer! The zuccini recipes look amazing and I am hitting myself because I made oatmeal chocolate chip breakfast muffins for the kids today and i could have hidden some zuccini in them! Oh well, next time! I am the first link whooo hooo! doing the happy dance…my recipe is a mark bittman one that turned my hatred of brussel sprouts into love! Have a great weekend and thanks for sharing your space with us! Alex@amoderatelife
Both of these recipes look delicious! I love sneaking vegetables into dessert! I linked up a compilation of summer squash recipes; it’s that time of year…
Hmm, zucchini bread with chocolate in it – yum! I linked to a zucchini post also!
If you like zucchini brownies, you would love these zucchini muffins: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Chocolate-Zucchini-Muffins/Detail.aspx. I keep a batch in the freezer to put in my husband’s lunch. Really easy too. Zucchini and chocolate are such a great combination.
That is so impressive that your son did this all!
What a way to build his confidence–teaching him! Love it. 
Those recipes both look fantastic. We have a glut of zucchini right now, so I have been looking for some ways to use it up.
Some bunnies ate our cucumber plants, so we haven’t gotten a single one yet.
Wow these recipes look so yummy
I definitely gonna try the cake!
Thanks for sharing,
Tes
I think that is great that you have your son cooking!! I am pregnant with a boy, and I have a one year old girl, and it is my goal to have them both helping out around the kitchen. Thanks for sharing your awesome story!!
Thanks for sharing these great recipes! I haven’t tried baking with zucchini yet!
I added zucchini to my sloppy joes that I linked up today! I also linked up a tip for easier breading for fried zucchini!
We love zucchini here!
Thanks for sharing those delicious looking zucchini recipes – I’ve got lots of zucchini growing in my garden and as we are away on holiday right now there should be tons ready to pick when we get back. It’s great to know I’ve got some super recipes to try with them!
Yum — both of these look amazing! Thanks for sharing!
Both the bread and brownies look great. We got our zucchini in so late that I don’t think we will have any at all. Luckily, we have friends with more than enough to share! Can’t wait to try the brownies.
yum! I’ve got a zucchini bread recipe I’m happy with but I’ll have to try those brownies!
as far as non-sweet zucchini recipes, I just posted a favorite recently–I’ll add it to Mr. Linky
so glad your son was in the kitchen with you I think it is so fun to cook with kids and teens
Yum! Your pictures look great, and I didn’t know you added chocolate chips to your zucchini bread! That looks awesome! I finally got my post up today, about what else but zucchini bread! Tis the season! Thanks for being partners in zucchini crime!
Looks Yummy!
Janis
I’m in the same zucchini mindset and with chocolate, too, except mine is chocolate zucchini bread.
Loved that you baked with your son. I remember baking zucchini bread with my son and have some adorable photos like you do. 
Will take another look at the zucchini brownies and perhaps convert them to gluten free. 
Thanks so much for hosting. Have a great weekend, Ann!
Shirley
I love zucchini bread but I haven’t tried zuke brownies. They sound delish! Thanks! Hope you like my chick pea potato curry stew. I notice I’ve been posting lots of chick pea recipes lately but they are just so good!
I love zucchini bread and those brownies look wonderful! I’m sad I didn’t get to plant zucchini this year, I love it but I share my veggie garden with a friend who doesn’t like it at all! In the end there was just no room for it as we only have a small plot.
Those both sound amazing!
wow looks great
Thanks, Ann!
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