Chocolate Zucchini Cake

My quest to use zucchini has continued. I have used it in pasta sauces, omelets, pizzas and any other place I could think of to shove some zucchini it into. Meanwhile, my dear husband has taken great pride in "inflicting" zucchini on his co-workers, family and friends.

Today, we ran out of zucchini. No, you did not misread that last sentence. I actually had two zucchini filled recipes planned for today, but did not have enough zucchini. In a urgent search through the garden I did find some other squashes (no idea what specifically they are), but was only able to find one additional green zucchini. Needless to say, you only get one zucchini recipe today. Good thing it is delicious.

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

Ingredients

• 1 cup butter, soft
• 1/2 cup olive oil (may substitute oil of your choice)
• 1 cup brown sugar (check-out person at Trader Joe's suggested using brown sugar because his family's recipe uses brown sugar.
• 1/2 cup sugar (mostly because I finished off my bag of brown sugar)
• 1 teaspoon almond extract (should have been vanilla, but I didn't have any and I have overheard co-workers saying they always use almond extract in place of vanilla)
• 2-1/2 cups whole wheat flour (or whatever all purpose four you have lying around)
  
• 2 tablespoons of high quality baking cocoa
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 2 cups shredded zucchini
  
• 1/2 cup sliced almonds (or nuts of choice), optional
• 1/2 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

Directions
1. Pre-heat oven to 350

2. Shred zucchini.

3. In a mixing bowl, beat the butter oil and sugar.


4. Add the eggs, buttermilk and vanilla; mix well.

5. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon. Gradually add to other mixture.




6. Stir in zucchini.


7. Spread into a greased 13-9 inch baking pan.

8. Sprinkle with chocolate chips and nuts. I only sprinkles nuts over 2/3 of the pan because not everyone love nuts.

9. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes. Remove carefully because the chocolate chips are hot. I got some melted chocolate chip on one of my hot pads and then touched it by mistake. Ouch! On the same note, make sure to let it cool before eating.



Hope you enjoy this recipe! It was relatively easy to make, even with the constant interruption of tornado sirens. Brutus (my bulldog) and I spent sometime in the basement between steps of this recipe. It turned out moist and delicious with a light chocolate flavor that will keep you coming back for more. It is fabulous served warm with a cool glass of milk.

Best Pizza Ever! (AKA pesto-licous, zucchinily goodness pizza)

This pizza is not only pesto-licous, but it uses up zucchini from the garden (and shouldn't that be the ultimate goal of any summer pizza?).

Start out with the pizza dough recipe in the previous posting. Make sure to do the quick pre-bake it calls for.

Smear pesto (I promise I will get John to post the recipe...please do not get it from a jar) over the crust of the pizza. Cover pizza with chopped zucchini, sliced mushrooms, and peppers. Top the pizza with fresh basil leaves from the garden. Sprinkle mozzarella over the top with moderation (trust me, when the pizza is this good it doesn't need to be drowned in cheese).

Place on warm pizza stone in oven and bake for 7-10 minutes. Oven should still be pre-heated to 450 degrees from the pre-bake.


Remove from the oven, slice and enjoy! This will redefine your concept of pizza.

Pizza - The Crust

We've made a number of pizzas using vegetables and herbs from our garden. Pizza is something that John has worked hard to develop a solid recipe for, and his techniques. The foundation of a good pizza is the crust. From there, the variations are infinite.

Pizza Crust

Ingredients
1 cup warm water (approx 100 F)
2 1/4 tsp instant yeast (1 packet)
2 Tbsp honey
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 Tbsp olive oil

Special Equipment
Large cutting board or clean counter top
Rolling Pin (optional)
Pizza Stone
Peel

Place pizza stone in the lower 1/3 of the oven. Preheat oven to 450 F.

Combine yeast, water and honey into a large mixing bowl. Add flour 1 cup at a time, salt and olive oil. Stir ingredients together until the dough forms a ball around the spatula. Use your hands to knead the dough for a minute or two, to make sure that there are no pockets of dry flour. Cover and set in a warm place for 30 minutes.



Uncover the bowl. Dough should have risen and doubled in size. Lightly flour your hands. Punch the dough down, and turn the bowl out onto a lightly floured counter or large board. Using a bench scraper or sharp knife, divide the dough in two.

Form half of the dough into a ball. Flatten the ball with the heel of your hand. Use your hand to push the dough out from the center, to the edges of the circle. Eventually lift the circle and place it on the knuckles of a fist. Using a series of gentle tosses, expand the dough until you've got a 12-16" circle. Alternately, use a rolling pin to flatten the dough, working from the middle to the edges. Be sure to pinch the edges up to form a thicker crust. Dough should be about 1/8" thick.
If the dough starts sticking to the board, sprinkle flour beneath it on the board. If the dough starts to tear, stop working it, and let it rest for at least ten minutes.

Let the dough rest for approximately 10 minutes while you prep other ingredients. Flour your peel and slide the dough onto it. Transfer the dough to the hot pizza stone, close the oven and bake for 5-7 minutes. Slide the peel under the dough and remove it from the oven. You are now ready to put your toppings on the pizza.



Variations-

Whole wheat dough - Replace all purpose flour with 1 1/2 cups bread flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour.

Herb dough - Mix 2 Tbsp dry or finely chopped Italian spices into the dough. Dry basil, oregano, and marjoram work well.

Cheesy dough - Add 1/4 to 1/3 cup of finely grated Parmesan cheese, and an additional 2 Tbsp olive oil to the recipe.

Alternate ingredients - 2 Tbsp of white sugar or light corn syrup can be used in place of honey.

Ant Wars!

For at least three days the bloody battles ragged on the front steps of my house. I'm embarrassed to say that at first I did not notice the carnage and atrocities taking place on my own property. One day, after walking the dog, I noticed a step on my walkway was completely covered with ants. I assumed that they had found a juicy bit of something there. We usually use our back door, so for several days I was blind to the true nature of the events that were occurring.

Later that week, I went out to water the plants at the front of the house. I noticed that the ants, though less of them this time, were still at it. Now, instead of completely covering the step, they took up about a third of the area. Back to watering...In the garden I noticed several ant hills were surrounded with little black things. When I leaned into investigate I discovered the truth of what was happening in my own front yard. Every ant hill in my garden was surrounded by dead bodies of fallen ants.

At first, I was startled. Had there been some sort of mass poisoning? Could whatever killed all these thousands of ants threaten the health and welfare of our dear puppy Brutus? Then I went back to the huge congregations of ants on my step. What were they up too? It was then that I noticed that the ants were not just congregating. They were, in fact, three deep. Crawling on each other, pushing each other, attacking each other. It seemed that a major objective was to throw each other off the side of our step. There was a full on ant war going on on my front steps!

I had seen ant wars once before in my life, back when I was in the Minnesota Conservation Corps. Big ants were fighting small ants. Big ants would climb up a pillar and dive off of it into the middle of small ants. One big ant was stronger then the small ants for sure, but three small ants could rip apart a big one. It was horrifying and intriguing at the same time. Also, slightly comforting that our species was not along on our planet in trying to destroy itself through war.

This battle was between the same kind of ants. Both small. How did they tell who was on which side? What was the battle over? Were they in fact battling over the territory that I considered my property? Were they battling over control of my front garden? Who won? Our the ants in my garden the ones that have always been there or invaders who took over their territory.

You could watch the ants thrown off the step (that survived the fall) march right back into battle. Were they afraid? Did some flee? Did they feel a sense of duty and courage?


The battle site. One step on the walkway going up to our house.

Dead bodies of fallen soilders surrounding ant holes:

Orange Almond Zucchini Bundt Cake

Be prepared for the yummiest way to use the excess zucchini in your garden. This cake is moist and has an excellent flavor.

Cake:
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cloves
3 eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 1/3 cups sugar
1/2 cup orange juice
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 1/2 cups shredded zucchini
Orange Icing

Heat oven to 350 degrees F.

Mix flour, baking powder, soda, salt cinnamon and cloves.
Shred zucchini with a food processor. I chose yellow zucchini because yellow seemed more cake like to me.



In second bowl, beat eggs, whisk in oil, sugar, juice, extract and zucchini. Mix well.



Add to flour mixture, stirring just to moisten. Pour into greased bundt pan.



Bake 55-60 minutes: cool on rack 10 minutes. I was very excited to use the new silicon bundt I received as a wedding gift. The original recipe said to invert. When I tried to invert, the cake promptly slid right out of the pan. I do not recommend inverting for this recipe.




Orange Icing:
2 tablespoons butter or margarine
3 cups confectioners' sugar
1/4 cup orange juice
2 teaspoons lemon juice
Sliced almonds (I bought slivered almonds and regretted not get pretty sliced ones)


In small bowl beat together butter, confectioners' sugar, orange juice and lemon juice until well blended.


Spoon the glaze over the top of the cake and allow it to drip down the sides.


If you want to wrap the finished cake with sliced almonds.





You may want to use another type of pan. Here are the baking times I found:
one 13 x 9 x2-inch baking pan - bake 35-40 minutes.
two 9-inch square pans - bake about 35 minutes
two 8 x 4 x 2 1/2 inch loaf pans - bake about 45 minutes
24 cupcakes - bake 20-25 minutes

Health Factor MIA and Purple things

I've been kind of disappointed in my cooking entries lately. They aren't exactly the healthiest of foods. Truth is we eat a lot of grilled vegetables and salads, but they aren't really blog worthy. Simple is sometimes best with delicious fresh ingredient. A lot of the recipes I've flagged to try using delicious vegetables, I've realized just add a lot of carbs and unneeded calories already delicious vegetables.

My suggestions is to just take vegetables, chop them, put a little olive oil on them, sprinkle with a seasoning if desired and grill them. Yum! Everything taste good when grilled.

Now that I've said that, I will start adding the other items I've made. Also, expect a fabulous pizza entry from my dear husband soon. He is the pizza making king! His pizzas are more healthy and delicious then your typical pizza.

Picture of Salad. Not interesting enough to right a whole blog about but good. Contains cherry tomatoes from our garden and purple carrots (fabulously colorful: purple on the side, orange and yellow in the middle) and mixed greens and herbs:

John and I love purple veggies. Whether purple carrots, peppers,tomatoes, green beans, cabbage or basil it just adds visual diversity to any dish and makes it special. My suggestions is to go the the Farmer's Market and pick-up so purple vegetables.

Best Pancakes Ever!

Husband cooked, but I was his inspiration (okay, it could have been the fabulous raspberries we picked up at the farmers market that inspired him). These were the BEST pancakes I have ever had! So tasty it would be a crime to smother them in syrup or anything else for that matter. We ate them topped with a light dollop of whip cream (from a can). If the tastiness of these pancakes doesn't convince you (and I feel like a traitor because I've been a loyal Bisquick fan for years), then at least make these because they are whole wheat.

Ingredients:
1 large egg
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tablespoon of dark brown sugar
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup raspberries
non-stick cooking spray

1) Beat egg in bowl until fluffy (may want to use hand beater for this). Beat in remaining ingredients except margarine and raspberries. Once batter is smooth, add about 3/4s the raspberries and mix lightly.

2. Heat griddles over medium heat. Spray with non-stick cooking spray.

4. For each pancake, pour slightly less then 1/4 a cup of batter onto the hot griddle. Cook pancake until puffed and dry around the edges. Turn and cook other side until golden brown.

5. Garnish cooked pancakes with remaining raspberries. You may want to add a dollop of whipped cream, or a drizzle of honey or maple syrup to taste. We did a little dollop of whipped cream and it was perfect!

Now for the tasty pictures:


Halfway eaten, these pancakes still look good: