Recipe: Chocolate Zucchini Bread

Ruth, here is another recipe, from Penzey's.

Chocolate Zucchini Bread
Here in Wisconsin, zucchini grows with abandon, so we are always coming up with new and delicious ways to use it. And the best part about this recipe is the kids won't even know there's zucchini in it.

3 large eggs
2 Cups sugar
1 Cup vegetable oil
1 tsp. PURE VANILLA EXTRACT
2 TB. butter
6 TB. NATURAL COCOA POWDER
2 Cups zucchini, grated
2 Cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. CHINA CINNAMON
2/3 Cup semi sweet chocolate chips
2 tsp. flour
1 Cup chopped nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 .

In a large mixing bowl, combine eggs, sugar, oil, and VANILLA EXTRACT. Mix until well blended.

In a small saucepan, melt 2 TB. butter, add 6 TB. COCOA POWDER and blend together until smooth. Set aside to cool.

Peel and grate the zucchini. Add zucchini and cooled COCOA mixture to the large mixing bowl and blend well.

In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, salt, and CINNAMON. Add dry ingredients to the batter. Stir only enough to blend in all the dry ingredients.

In another small bowl, coat the chocolate chips with 2 tsp. flour. This helps prevent them from sinking to the bottom of the pan. Add the flour-coated chocolate chips to the batter.

Spoon the batter into two generously greased and floured 9x5x3 loaf pans. Bake for 60-70 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Cool in the pans for 5-10 minutes. Remove from pans and continue to cool on a wire rack.

Prep. time: 15 minutes
Baking time: 60-70 minutes
Yield: 2 loaves