Our Staple Zucchini Bread

Our garden (like most!) yields waaaayyyy too much zucchini for us to handle. We try adding it to everything, but there is only so much you can do with zucch. We used to grow a Seeds of Change variety, but then last year we switched to the Costata Romanesco zucchini (easy to find, we got ours from Baker Creek Seeds).

Costata has a really nice nutty texture and the flesh stays pretty crisp, so it is perfect for the zucchini bread the girls like.

• If I have it, I like to plump the raisins up beforehand in some orange juice and then cut the sugar some.
  
• Also, I can cut the oil in 1/2 with applesauce (1/2 c applesauce + 1/2 c oil).
  
• Finally, we like to cook this up in the bundt cake, makes it easier to control the portion size and it just looks fancier!
  

Ingredients:

- 3 large eggs

- 1 cup sugar (half brown and half white sugar)

- 1 cup oil (see note #2 above)

- 2 cups white flour

- 1/2 t baking powder

- 1 t salt

- 1 t baking soda

- 2 t cinnamon

- 1 t allspice

- 1 t cloves

- 1 t fresh nutmeg

- 1 cup plumped raisins

- 2 to 3 cups zucchini

Preheat the oven to 350 F.

1. Mix eggs, oil and sugar together till well blended.
   
2. Add flour, powder, salt, soda, and spices.
   
3. Mix the whole lot together till well blended.
   
4. Add raisins and zucchini and mix till just combined.
   
5. Pour into a greased bundt pan or a 9x5 or 8x8 or whatever pan you have lying about.
   
6. Bake for 1 hour or until the toothpick test comes out clean (less in wider lower pans, I would check at 50 minutes with an 8x8).
   

This is also a great base recipe for substitutions

1. Pureed pumpkin or squash for zucchini (might add some dry milk powder to balance).
   
2. Applesauce instead of zucchini (more spicing and less oil).
   
3. Carrot "cake-bread" might work here too.
   
4. Winter zucchini cake - we grate the zucchini in summer and freeze in 1 lb baggies. Make sure you drain the grated zucchini before adding it.