Foodie Friday: Zucchini Quick-Breads

The other day, my friend Jennifer gave me some giant zucchinis she grew in her garden. It inspired me to make these zucchini breads and muffins. (I've modified this recipe slightly.) This recipe is a great way to use up Summer zucchini, especially if it's gotten way too big!

One great thing about this recipe is it can make muffins or bread or a combination of both at the same time. Another great thing is it can be made more hearty and higher in fiber with a few modifications. If you want more cake-like, dessert breads, stick to the regular recipe, but if you want the darker, whole-grain version, use the modifications (in parentheses).

Ingredients:

3 cups grated fresh zucchini
⅔ cup melted butter or margarine
1 ⅓ cup white cane sugar (½ cup brown cane sugar and ½ cup + ⅓ cup white cane sugar)
2 eggs, beaten
1 Tablespoon vanilla
2 teaspoons baking soda
a pinch of salt
(4 Tablespoons water)
(2 Tablespoons flax meal)
3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (2 cups all-purpose flour, 1 cup whole wheat flour)
2 teaspoons cinnamon
¼ teaspoon nutmeg

• Preheat the oven to 350°F.
• (Mix the flaxseed meal and water and let sit for 3-5 minutes.)
• In a large bowl, mix together the sugar, eggs, and vanilla.
• Mix in the grated zucchini and then the melted butter. If you have a giant zucchini, remove the seeds prior to grating.
• Sprinkle baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in. (Stir in the flax/water mixture.)
• Add the flour, a third at a time.
• Sprinkle in the cinnamon and nutmeg and mix. (Fold in the nuts.)

For loaves of bread:

• Divide the batter equally between two buttered 5 by 9 inch loaf pans. 
• Bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour or until a wooden pick inserted in to the center comes out clean. (Ours took 50 minutes.) 
• Cool in pans for 10 minutes, then turn out onto wire racks to cool thoroughly.

For regular-sized muffins:

• Coat each muffin cup in your muffin pan with a little butter or vegetable oil spray. Use a spoon to distribute the muffin dough equally among the cups, filling the cups up completely. 
• Bake on the middle rack until muffins are golden brown, and the top of the muffins bounce back when you press on them, about 25 to 30 minutes. (Ours took 25 minutes.) 
• Set on wire rack to cool for 5 minutes. Remove muffins from the tin let cool another 20 minutes.

For mini muffins:

• Same as above, except bake for 12 to 18 minutes. (Ours took 15 minutes.)

We made a double-batch of this batter and it only used up one of the giant zucchinis we had. The bread batch made two loaves, and the muffin batch (which had walnuts in it, so there was slightly more batter) made 12 regular-sized muffins and 19 mini-muffins.

Jaymz ate his with confetti icing

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Linked up at Vegetarian Foodie Fridays at Breastfeeding Moms Unite!, Foodie Friday at Designs by Gollum, Fight Back Friday at Food Renegade, Friday Food at Momtrends, Food on Friday at Ann Kroeker, Wholesome Whole Foods at Health Food Lover, Friday Favorites at Simply Sweet Home.