Chocolate Zucchini Cake

This is from my mother's recipe collection. It's handwritten on a scrap paper, so I have no idea whence the recipe came, but there are quirks and notes that show her particular adaptations. I do remember that we started making this cake when I was about 10 years old, and that we never put walnuts in it, despite their presence as written. Instead, my mother was known to use chocolate chips (including one time, memorably, orange chocolate chips) or just omit the nuts entirely. There may have been an ill-advised attempt to use pumpkin seeds, about which we will speak no more.

As you can see, this is a big cake. It keeps well on the counter, better in the fridge (if you have room), but is delicious enough that it probably won't have to wait around for very long.

A note on grating zucchini: I find that short strands are much easier to work with than long strands, so I recommend slicing the zucchini in half lengthwise almost to the stem, and then holding the two halves together to grate across the cut. This gives very short strands that are easy to use, whether you are making fritters or cakes.

My mother always used soft "golden" brown sugar, but plain white granulated sugar also works fine.

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

fills a 10-12 cup Bundt pan/Bundform/Gugelhupfform

125 ml (1/2 cup) canola oil
300 grams (1 1/2 cups) sugar
3 large eggs
200 grams (2 cups) grated zucchini
6 grams (1 heaped tablespoon) orange zest
10 ml (2 teaspoons) vanilla extract
300 grams (2 1/2 cups) all purpose flour
65 grams (1/2 cup) cocoa powder
12.5 ml (2 1/2 teaspoons) baking powder
7.5 ml (1 1/2 teaspoons) baking soda
5 ml (1 teaspoon) kosher or coarse sea salt
5 ml (1 teaspoon) ground cinnamon
125 grams (1 cup) chopped walnuts (or chocolate chips) - optional
125 ml (1/2 cup) milk

My mother's ever-cryptic instructions are: Pour into bundt pan, bake at 350° 1 hr. Cool in pan 15 min, then turn out and glaze: mix 2 cups icing sugar, 2 tbsps milk, 1 tsp vanilla

For those who didn't grow up with these astonishingly abbreviated instructions, try this:

Preheat oven to 180°C/350°F, with a rack in the lower-middle slot. Prepare a 10-12 cup ring-shaped cake pan by spraying with cooking spray, oiling lightly or greasing lightly with butter.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the oil and sugar and beat with a wooden spoon or whisk until smooth. Add the eggs, and beat again. Add the grated zucchini and the vanilla extract, and stir through.

In a separate, medium mixing bowl, combine the flour, cocoa powder (sifted), baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and optionally walnuts. Add these combined dry ingredients to the wet mixture and start to gently stir together. After a few rounds with the spoon, add the milk, and then continue to gently stir until just combined and there are no more dry streaks in the batter.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan, and place it in the preheated oven. Bake for 1 hour, or until a toothpick or spaghetti strand poked into the centre comes out clean. Let cool in the pan on a rack for 15 minutes, before turning out of the pan. Glaze, or let cool completely.



As you can see, the glaze in my mother's instructions is for a standard white glaze, although you could exchange some of the icing sugar for cocoa powder to make a cocoa glaze if you like. You can use pretty much any glaze or frosting/icing you fancy. I've gone a different route here and used a chocolate ganache made from melted down Easter bunnies with added butter and cream. Your mileage may vary.