It’s pretty crazy that after almost six years of blogging, I don’t have a zucchini muffin or bread recipe up here yet. Believe it or not I actually do eat a lot of vegetables (a girl can’t live off sweets alone!) and with all the huge zucchinis showing up in gardens and markets, I had to take advantage. Baking with zucchini is very popular because it adds a lot of moisture and substance to things like muffins and quick breads without any vegetable taste. And the double dose of chocolate in these beauties didn’t hurt the flavor either! Looking at these you might not think they’re healthy, but I promise they’re packing more nutrients and less sugar and butter than the normally scheduled programming here!
With zucchini, vegetable oil, Greek yogurt, and sour cream we’ve got a lot of ingredients working to make sure these muffins are soft and moist. There’s nothing worse than a dry muffin! These muffins definitely look and taste decadent thanks to all that moisture and dark chocolate color, but they’re a lot less sinful than they look. I added a few chocolate chips to the tops of each muffin so they appear even more inviting and because, well, why not! I borrowed this recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction, and I’ve always loved her muffin recipes. This one is actually adapted from a zucchini bread recipe of hers, and turns out it makes excellent muffins too. Mmmmm….
If you have some zucchinis laying around and you’re looking for a sweet but relatively healthy treat for back to school, these muffins are a must. They’re easy to throw together, they freeze well, and they’d be perfect for an after-school snack. Or an anytime snack if you’re looking for something sweet with a tad less guilt!
Double Chocolate Zucchini Muffins
Recipe adapted from Sally's Baking Addiction
Yield: 10 muffins
Ingredients:
1 and 1/2 cups shredded zucchini
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (I used Hershey's Special Dark)
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp instant espresso powder
2 large eggs
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup plain Greek yogurt
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips, divided
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees and line 10 muffin tins with cupcake liners. Set aside. Place the shredded zucchini on a couple paper towels and pat with additional paper towels to absorb some of the moisture
In a large bowl, whisk the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and instant espresso togehter. In another bowl, whisk together the eggs, oil, yogurt, sugar, and vanilla together until smooth. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and lightly whisk until combined.
Using a rubber spatula, fold in the zucchini the chocolate chips by hand. Mix just until evenly mixed. Divide the batter evenly among the 10 muffins tins and stick a few extra chocoalte chips onto the top of each muffin. Bake for 5 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 350 degrees and continue to bake for another 15 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean. Check your muffins around 12 minutes and every minute until 15 because you definitely do not want these to dry out! Allow muffins to cool for 5 minutes in the pan, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
How unique! And awesome! I’ve never heard of baking desserts with zucchini. I’ll definitely have to give this a try. :-) Thanks!! -Jacquin http://www.InteriorsbyJacquin.blogspot.com