Do you ever have a recipe that everyone raves about, but you just can’t get into it? I recently received a zucchini that was as big as my arm, and my first thought was zucchini bread! I grew up enjoying zucchini bread all the time, but most of my friends had never even tried it—can you believe that?
I decided to whip up a batch, and the reactions were great! Everyone loved it, but it just didn’t taste like the zucchini bread I was used to. I have such fond memories of the one from a farmer’s market in Long Beach, right in front of Cabrillo. I think they stopped selling it ages ago. My aunts would occasionally make it, and my mom tried her hand at it a couple of times, but it wasn’t really her thing, so we often bought it instead.
The bread I grew up with had this perfect, rich golden-brown crust, similar to banana bread. We would get three different kinds: regular, chocolate zucchini, and chocolate chip zucchini—yum! But I always ended up with the regular since that was what I had to work with. I used the generic recipe my mom mentioned, but it just didn’t capture the magic of the one I remembered. I totally understand why she didn’t make it more often if the recipe I used was what she had tried. It wasn’t bad, not at all, just not quite what I was hoping for.
I will share the recipe my mom gave me, but now I’m going to experiment. I’m going to try to recreate the dish I knew as a kid. Is it possible to recreate a recipe just by taste? I’m not sure, but we will find out!
Ingredients
- 3 cups grated fresh zucchini, about 4 zucchini
- 1 ½ cup granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
- 3/4 cup butter melted (1 ½ sticks)
- 3 cups all-purpose flour properly measured
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease two 8×4-inch loaf pans. I like to use nonstick spray with flour. Set aside.
- Place the grated zucchini in a colander in the sink while you continue.
- 3 cups grated fresh zucchini
- Mix sugar, eggs, vanilla, salt, and butter in a large bowl.
- 1 ½ cup granulated sugar,2 large eggs,2 teaspoons vanilla extract,1/4 teaspoon kosher salt,3/4 cup butter
- The butter should be just melted but not hot.
- Add flour, baking soda, and cinnamon, and whisk in until just combined.
- 3 cups all-purpose flour,2 teaspoons baking soda,2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- Stir in grated zucchini until just incorporated.
- Divide batter between prepared loaf pans.
- Bake for 40-60 minutes, or until a wooden toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.4
- Cool in pans for 10 minutes.
- Run a thin knife around the edges, and remove the zucchini bread onto wire cooling racks to finish cooling.
