Let the games begin! First, a small disclaimer; I have made this without walnuts, because one of the possible judges has a nut allergy, and that just wouldn’t be fair to the first contender.
I think I ought to have a category tag titled “Serendipitous Breads”, because I started this post having found two zucchini recipes that are different enough from each other, one being considerably fancier, only to get word from my spy at the store that there were no. zucchini. in. stock. After a few deep breaths, spies then reported that they had found the last zucchini in the store! Huzzah! And so we find our heroine, with borrowed iPhone in hand for visual documentation, marching bravely into kitchen stadium…wait. That’s Iron Chef. I’ll just bake the thing and get on with it. ♥
2 c. all purpose flour
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground allspice
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 1/2 c. sugar
1 1/2 c. vegetable oil
3 eggs
1 Tbsp vanilla extract
2 tsp grated lemon peel – I’m fond of lemon, and so I threw in at least 1 Tbsp, to be honest. I almost always throw in at least 1 Tbsp of lemon into everything. I even had lemon zest on shepherds pie last week, and it was surprisingly good!
…I have another confession; I squeezed an impromptu bit of lemon juice into the liquid mixture after adding the lemon zest – if I had to guess, maybe 1 tsp? I believe it made a pleasant difference.
2 c. coarsely grated zucchini – from the lovely zucchini pictured below:
1 cup walnuts, toasted, coarsely chopped
Preheat oven to 325°F.
Butter and flour two 8x4x2 1/2-inch metal loaf pans. (I made do with one looooong pan and one very baby pan.)
Combine flour, cinnamon, salt, baking soda, allspice, and baking powder in medium bowl. In a Kitchenaid mixer – what can I say, I love them – with a whisk attachment, combine sugar, vegetable oil, eggs, vanilla, and lemon peel.
…I have another confession; I squeezed an impromptu bit of lemon juice into the liquid mixture after adding the lemon zest – if I had to guess, maybe 1 tsp? I believe it made a pleasant difference.
Add Flour mixture gradually, remove bowl from mixer and fold in zucchini…and walnuts, if you don’t care about your loved ones with allergies.
Pour batter into prepared pans. If I were adding nuts, I like to place halved walnuts on top in cute daisy patterns. But not today…sigh.
This was my first experience baking two loaves at once, let alone loaves of different sizes. Epicurious advised a little over an hour, for two equal pans, so I baked them together for 35 mins, checking every ten minutes until at 50 mins the smallest loaf was done, and at 1 hour ten mins the long loaf was finished.
Let stand 10 minutes, if you can stand it! Turn breads out onto rack and cool completely. To store, I wrap in foil and leave at room temperature; these loaves of mine tend to go pretty quickly, so I’ve never really had to see about storing them for more than 24 hours.
Watched Tonari no Totoro again this week! Disney finally re-released the DVD, and while I suspect they’ve redone the Japanese actors as well as the American, it was still the great movie I remember.
We love Totoro!
I just got home from Eastern Washington to word that the enormous loaf I left with family is essentially gone. So the recipe is going up before the final pics, which I need from that borrowed camera…hint, hint.
Enjoy!
♥ Momo