Between our two CSAs, Meredith and I received several pounds of zucchini - big ones, little ones, long ones, round ones. What's a girl to do? Make two different kinds of zucchini bread (apparently). Meredith opted for regular (read about it here), while I decided to go back to a recipe that I've tried and loved before - Clotilde Dusoulier's Chocolate Zucchini Cake.
A side note - Meredith took and photoshopped all these pictures. Gotta love her. Please don't tell me that her pictures are way better than mine. I already know that. Really. Also, I can't quite get all of them to work right now.....I'm getting there, I promise - technical help is needed.
But back to the cake. You can check out the recipe yourself here. I don't follow it exactly - when this recipe was published in the cookbook "Chocolate & Zucchini," a few details had been changed and I followed them - you'll be able to see what they are as I go along.
First I grated up my zucchini! This is an action shot. Meredith took it. She's fancy like that.
Then I chopped up some bittersweet chocolate. Usually, I'd buy bittersweet chocolate chips, but I couldn't find any in Hudson. I did find a huge bar of bittersweet chocolate though...as you can see (or would if I could get my pictures to work).
I put them in a bowl, along with a half cup of flour and mixed it up. This is so that the zucchini and chocolate chips don't sink straight to the bottom of the cake.
Then you take a new bowl and mix your dry ingredients together - flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Whisk it up good so that it's all even.
Then you set it aside and mix brown sugar and olive oil together. I know, you're thinking "olive oil? That's crazy." But you're wrong. It is perfectly delicious and way better for you than butter. Then you mix in some vanilla and 3 eggs, one at a time.
Slowly incorporate the flour mixture to the wet mixture. The batter will be really thick. Then mix in your zucchini/chocolate concoction.
Here's my batter and Meredith's batter, side by side.
And here's the finished cake! I baked it at 350 degrees for about 50 minutes.
It was very good. You can't even really taste the zucchini (which could be a plus or a minus). It was nice and chocolatey. Who doesn't like that? Meredith's was excellent as well - super moist and delicious. Here we are, competitors no more and friends again, pretending to toast each other at our fake wedding.
2 comments:
That was a very fun battle. I think you win in the category of healthiest chocolatiest chocolate cake ever, and I win in the zucchiniest zucchini bread category.
Sorry for the technical difficulties. I was asleep when you wrote this.
Lena
Zack's Aunt Vera reading your blog because Joe said I'd enjoy it. Since I have never read a blog, I don't know if I responding correctly and since I don't know your email address, this is the only way I can contact you. So, by way of Joe, would you please answer the following question: you replaced the butter in the recipe with olive oil. Did you us the exact same measurement (1/2 cup). I would like to make the healthier recipe and use the olive oil.
Thanks Vera
Post a Comment