Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Chocolate Zucchini Cake
I stayed with a lovely family in Victoria, BC. In exchange, my billet got to stay at my family's home in the West Island (in the province of Quebec). I remember learning all about BC and its wonderfully rich history and culture. The climate, flora and fauna also struck me as being totally different from what we experience in Quebec.
If I have to be honest, I'll say that what I remember most is how amazing my host family was. My billet and I quickly became good friends and had late night chats with her mom over yummy treats! Among those treats was this fabulous Chocolate Zucchini Cake! I had never ever heard of chocolate and zucchini together! It was such an odd combination!
It was the best chocolate cake I had ever had though! So moist!
Years later...Okay, let's do the math. That was Summer of '92 and it's now 2011. Many years later, I have been longing for that cake recipe. I've lost touch with my host family, but have found several chocolate zucchini cake recipes on the internet (thank you, Google!). I've tweaked, played with, altered, incorporated, and have come up with a recipe I think is similar to the one my amazing host mother made for us back when I was 16 years old.
C's Chocolate Zucchini Cake
2 1/2 c flour1/2 c cocoa powder (for baking)
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
2 c sugar (Substitute sugar with more natural sweeteners like agave, demerara, etc)
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
3 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
2 c shredded zucchini (I used 3 c shredded zukes)
1 1/2 c vegetable oil OR
*1 jar prune puree (you can use the jarred baby food one if you don't make your own from scratch)
* Instead of using oil or butter, I used prune puree. If you want to use butter, use 3/4 c at room temperature. If you want to use oil, 1 1/2 cups veg oil.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Cream together your wet ingredients: butter/sugar or prune puree, eggs, cinnamon and vanilla.
Add flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa, and shredded zucchini to wet mixture.
Combine all ingredients together.
In a greased Bundt pan, pour batter.
Bake for 50 minutes.
Cool in pan for 15 min (Trust me! If you take it out sooner, it will fall apart into zillions of pieces and you'll never be able to salvage the cake! You won't have enough time to bake another for that important bake sale, bazaar, tea, fundraiser, or dinner party you were going to bring it to!) and then cool on wire rack.
You can make a simple glaze or a chocolate ganache to add on top of the cake, but my toddler loves it just as it is...along with some homemade applesauce on the side!
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City girl moves to the country, falls in love, and marries a farmer. She tries to incorporate her city ways with her new country lifestyle and blogs to keep in touch with friends, family & students who live far, far away :) Can this city girl go country? Watch as she learns all sorts of exciting things about life on the farm and in a small rural community. *UPDATE* We are now parents! Our baby girl was born on Nov. 11, 2008 (at 28 weeks gestation- 12 weeks premature, but she's quite the trooper)!!!
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12 comments:
This sounds great! Thanks for posting! Found your link via Twitter..I'll be back! Looks like you've got tonnes of great recipes!
Eve:
Thanks for popping by and leaving a comment! The cake is a hit with toddler and hubby! Surprising, since I thought Hubby would have rolled his eyes at zucchini IN cake!! :)
hi c - what a really neat combination! i will look for prune baby food this weekend along with zucchinis. i like that there's no added butter and sugar in here.
sounds good. I make zucchini muffins but never a cake- will have to try it!
How about you bake it for me and drive on down to Windsor and I will taste it ;)
I will be anybody's billet if they bring food ;)
Canine:
I was JUST thinking of you! Your parcel is ready to get mailed to you. I'll try to get it in the mail before I head to Toronto for a conference.
BusyMamma:
Mmmm! Zucchini muffins sound delish! Anything zucchini is a winner in my books though! I even love zucchini raw! Raw, sauteed with other veggies, in stir=fry, etc, etc, etc! Mmmm! Zucchini!!!
Kimberly:
I just may have to do that! For you, I'd do anything! ;)
hi c - i just did this recipe and i probably did something wrong. bert couldn't find a jar of the pureed prunes. instead, it was packaged in these tiny rectangular containers with a lid. i used only one and it probably wasn't enough. the batter was too dry and it didn't rise and look nice like your. bert said it smells good, but does it taste good? ha ha, i'll taste it tomorrow (it's nearly 11:30 pm now).
thanks in advance for the parcel!
Canine:
Oh, no! Really? I hope it tastes good :) The zucchini makes the cake really moist and delicious :) I did a little experiment. I made more of these zucchini cakes because everyone wanted me to. I made one cake with whole wheat flour and the other with regular all-purpose flour. Guess which one Hubby and everyone else liked best? Surprise! The whole wheat one! :)
hi c - i ended up throwing the cake away. it was hard as a rock. total cake FAIL for me. i used regular flour but that was the only substitution. i think i did not put enough of that prune stuff. plus my cocoa powder wasn't really sweet. i also tasted the cake and it was really bad. i must have done something wrong along the way. it didn't look like yours at all. i kind of feel lame, but hey, there's always next time, right?
Canine:
Oh, man! That sucks! LOL!!!! That's too bad :( It's truly the moistest cake I've ever made! I made four of them last week. 1 for our house, 1 for a dinner party, 1 for girls' night, and 1 for family. Total hit. Really moist, fluffy, and delish.
Ummm...I don't know what went wrong. If all else fails, maybe try the "with sugar" recipe! LOL! Use the sugar and the butter if the prune stuff isn't working out for you.