I honestly didn’t know zucchini bread was a thing until we started a garden.

Carrot cake, sure. My mom bakes the best carrot cake in the history of mankind. (I said what I said. Fight me.)

Zucchini bread, though, sounded like a bit of a reach to me. It was clearly just a way to use up excess zucchini.

I mean… is it even really bread? It’s definitely not really zucchini… not exactly.

Most versions I’ve seen seem to be a variation on a spice cake. Spice cake seems like one of those desserts people created back when nutmeg and cinnamon were the only seasonings Ma had available at the general store.

That might be fine for some folks, but frankly I want my sweet breads to taste like dessert.

So when I found out there were recipes for chocolate zucchini bread, everything changed.

Suddenly I looked forward to Zack hauling in a massive zucchini that got overlooked for a day or two. Full of big seeds and covered in a tough skin, big zucchini are not very good for sautéing as a side dish. Fortunately, they are perfect for grating up into zucchini bread.

And this zucchini bread is good enough to double.

It’s even good enough to freeze grated zucchini so you can have zucchini bread whenever you want. I know. Sounds crazy, I know.

But if you bake a lot – or even if you just eat chocolate cake a lot – you know that chocolate cake tends to be dry.

It’s something about the cocoa powder being hydrophobic. I know my root words, so I know that means it is “water-fearing,” or insoluble in water by itself. Beyond that, I don’t totally get it. It’s science. That’s for the fancy people.

Anyway, the zucchini somehow fixes the problem of the dang cocoa being afraid of water. Like banana bread, this chocolate zucchini bread is dense but not dry.

I should have known it would be when I saw that my girl Sally called this a fan favorite. If it’s a favorite among her readers, you know it’s going to be good.

Do yourself a favor and just double it. If you have an oversized zucchini, you’ll probably get enough to make four loaves, but that might be too much zucchini bread for a normal person.

Luckily, I’m not normal.

CHOCOLATE ZUCCHINI BREAD

Adapted from Sally’s Baking Addiction
Yield: 1 loaf

Ingredients:
1 cup flour
1/2 cup natural cocoa powder (such as Hershey’s)
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon espresso powder (optional, but recommended)
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
2 eggs
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/3 cup plain Greek yogurt (or sour cream)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups shredded zucchini

Directions:
■ Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a loaf pan or line with parchment paper and set aside.
■ In a large bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, salt and espresso powder. Stir in chocolate chips.
■ In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, oil, Greek yogurt or sour cream, sugar and vanilla until combined. Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients and stir until just combined. Gently fold in shredded zucchini.
■ Pour batter into prepared loaf pan. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, loosely covering with foil halfway through baking, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with a few moist crumbs attached.
■ Remove from oven and cool in pan on a wire rack for 1 hour. Remove from pan and allow to cool completely before slicing.

Amelia Plair is a mom and high school teacher in Starkville. Email reaches her at [email protected].

Amelia Plair is a Starkville resident who writes occasional food columns.

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