Pretty zucchini!
So I planted two zucchini plants and then I spent all summer ignoring them. They apparently love abuse so they returned the favor by birthing giant mutant zucchini. I took one today and ground it into a large bowl.
I stared at that bowl. What to do. What to do. I thought of zucchini cake I used to make in my formerly flabulous days. Then I remembered my figure in those days and decided that I needed to go a little slimmer, a little trimmer.
I set about looking for a recipe, and as I usually do I found one that looked good, but wasn’t quite right, and another that looked good but wasn’t clean, so I adapted and this is the outcome!
Ingredients
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 1/2 cups flour
2 tablespoons flax seed meal
2 tablespoons Chia Seed
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup sugar (pure dried cane)
1/2 cup coconut oil
3 large eggs
1 tsp real vanilla
1 cup plain fat-free yogurt
3 cups zucchini, shredded
10 ounces dark chocolate
Directions
- If not using dark chocolate chips, break up the dark chocolate into small chunks.
- Shred the zucchini and set aside and allow to drain a bit.
- Mix the dry ingredients together except sugar.
- Cream together eggs, sugar (note, you can use white sugar but I prefer organic dried cane sugar as it not only is minimally processed, but it adds an amazing flavor like a light brown sugar), and coconut oil. Canola oil or butter can be substituted.
- Add the yogurt and zucchini to the creamed mixture and then slowly mix in the dry.
- Last, add the chocolate and mix by hand.
- Put into prepared muffin tins. Be sure to grease them well!
- Bake at 400 for between 18 and 23 minutes. Watch them because they go from almost ready to ready very fast.
- Remove from muffin tins within five minutes and allow to cool on a rack or they stick to muffin tins.
- Share with friends.
Got out my grinder to grind my flax and WTF? I haven’t even used it! Fortunately I am strong like bull and put it back together.
- Ready to grind the flax! You need less fat if you use flax, plus it’s high in Omega 3s!!
Flax meal! Two tablespoons of seeds made more than two of meal so I threw it in with the bread I was baking.
Whisking together the dry stuff!
- Dry stuff all together. I actually added the sugar and forgot to cream it with the oil and eggs, but it was fine.
Coconut oil has been used for centuries in many cultures and is making a resurgence here. It is not, as some will tout, a miracle food but it is a decent healthy fat when used as part of a healthy diet.
Three of my little beauties! I wanted 24 reasonably sized muffins, not 12 giant nearly 500 calorie muffins. Why? Well because for 500 calories I can have a cupcake and these are chocolaty and rich enough that they don’t have to be huge. Besides, they’re still pretty big!
The inside of the muffin with the glistening gems of dark chocolate. Yup, they turned out just as I hoped they would! Nom-a-licious!