Zucchini Bread

Elizabeth HaitI'm feeling nostalgic. I have a few zucchinis and all I want to make with them is the zucchini bread from my childhood. Could I make something more healthy with them? Yes. Is it a bad idea to use the oven when the air conditioner has been acting finicky? Yes. So what did I do? Made the bread.

Another reason to make this bread is that my boyfriend, Neel, had a rough week at the dentist and is on a soft-food-only diet. So to mix up the macaroni and pudding and smoothies routine, I thought I could work a vegetable in there too.

The recipe I made growing up called for 2 cups of shredded zucchini so I started off my running all 3 of my squashes through the grater. It turned out to render just under 4 cups, we'll call that good enough! I'm pretty sure that I could feel my way through the recipe in my memory and get it mostly right, but I looked around here and found this recipe which looks like an incredibly close match so I'll just follow it so that I don't ruin my zucchini.

The procedure was different than I remember, or maybe I was too lazy to beat the eggs at age 11. I reduced the measure of sugar, 2 cups seems pretty extreme for bread. Especially if I'm going to pretend it's at all nutritious. The rest was easy enough. I subbed in my gluten-free flour blend and added in a measure of xanthan gum as well to make up for it.

Here came my problem. I have only 1 loaf pan. I have no idea what happened to my second one, must have gotten lost on one of my many moves over the years. So instead I used my trusty springform pan to make a shorter/thinner bread-cake-type-thing. It took less time to bake than the loaf, so I pulled it out about 10-15 minutes earlier than the loaf. The best part of this "problem" was that it had so much more crust surface area, which is my favorite part. I always ate the end slices first on the loaf of zucchini bread. But the round breadcake has sooo much crust area, and I may have to make this mistake again.

Neel agrees.

"What is this? Is there banana in there?"

"Nope. Just good old zucchini bread."

"Oh, it's amazing. Fluffy and moist, a smile inducer," he reviewed thoughtfully.

I think cutting the thin bread out with a cookie cutter helped get that last compliment! I then proceeded to eat the extra crust surrounding the hearts I cut for him. I couldn't let it go to waste could I?