A zucchini bread that's really cake but shh don’t tell.
I love to drift across the fine line between breakfast food and dessert. Yes, I get that from my mother. To me this is the ultimate zucchini bread because 1. It’s moist. 2. It is heavily dosed with ginger, my favorite. And 3. It is ½ bread and ½ crumble topping. The crumble topping is the best part.
Creating this recipe saved my butt because I, like so many, am overwhelmed with zucchini. This is the first year I decided to plant my own garden. I only have ONE zucchini plant and yet I have 3 zucchinis in my fridge. When I left for 3 days to visit the coast, I came home to a 2lb-er. He was the inspiration for making this recipe a double batch. Which is great because you can give one to a friend…or not ;).
king zuke plant
Recipe makes 2 loaves!!
Ingredients
The crumble:
100 g pecans, chopped
100 g AP flour
75 g sugar
50 g oats
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp kosher salt**
1 tsp fresh finely grated ginger
113 g (1 stick) unsalted butter, cubed
The bread:
454g AP flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp cardamom
2 tsp kosher salt**
426 g brown sugar
½ c neutral oil
180 g applesauce
4 eggs
2 lbs zucchini, grated
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 TBS fresh finely grated ginger
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Make the crumble topping. Combine pecans, flour, sugar, oats, cinnamon, salt, ginger in a medium bowl. Add cubed butter, and use your fingers to flake the butter (like you are making scones). The butter should be about the size of your index fingernail. Set crumble aside.
Now for the bread, grate your zucchini and butter 2 bread pans ahead of time. Whisk the dry: flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, salt in a large bowl. Mix the wet: brown sugar, oil, applesauce, eggs, zucchini, vanilla, and ginger in a separate large bowl. Fold dry ingredients into wet until the batter is lump-less.
Divide batter evenly(ish) between pans. Sprinkle prepared crumble on top. Bake for about 1 hr 15 minutes. If you have an accurate thermometer the bread should be about 205 degrees F. Otherwise, you can do the toothpick trick along with checking the crumble to see that it is golden.
DeeeeeLishhh
A thick slice of this with a little butter is nice, but the ultimate is when you drop a scoop of vanilla ice cream over a warm piece, and it immediately begins to melt. Just sayin.
Notes:
AP= all purpose
Pecans are not necessary, walnuts, hazelnuts, or sunflower seeds would do
Kosher salt is less salty than pink Himalayan so B CAREFUL
neutral oil means: vegetable, grapeseed, avocado, sunflower…there are probably more but that’s all I can think of
Griffin is the cutest and always deserves to be featured in a post.