Z is for Chocolate

I was invited to a baby shower recently. We were all to bring some food and/or drink, so I asked the mum-to-be if she had any particular food cravings. "Greens!" she replied. Given that she starts her mornings with power shakes made of all kinds of healthy plant matter, this was not an unexpected answer.

My immediate thought was, "chocolate zucchini".

To anyone familiar with carrot cake, this is not such a strange combination. The vegetal flavors fade into the batter -- the result doesn't taste like a salad -- and you are rewarded with cakes that have density and moisture. That said, I have never actually made any zucchini cakes before, nor did I have any recipes on hand. With Google as my guide, I went on a prowl.

Rejected were the recipes that demanded far too many ingredients or ingredients that were too elusive or expensive to obtain. I wasn't enthralled by the cakes that looked too spongy or airy, or the cakes that relied on heavy icing or chocolate chips for most of its flavor.

Somewhat predictably, I landed on the Chocolate Zucchini Cupcakes Recipe from one of my favorite cooking sites, 101 Cookbooks (already listed among my favorite links on this blog). This recipe predates my discovery of the blog, but I had a strong inkling that Heidi Swanson, the author, would have tackled such a recipe already.

The recipe was ridiculously easy to prepare. I opted to bake it in a mini cupcake pan, which reduced the baking time to 10 min. I was a little heavy-handed in the quantity of zucchini, chocolate chips, allspice and cinnamon, feeling confident that the outcome would not suffer as a result. The cupcakes were dark, spicy, molten chocolate bites -- exactly what I was aiming for. They were deadly good at any temperature: hot, cold or room temp. It helps to use good quality chocolate and pure vanilla extract (not that artificial crap, ptoui! ptoui!).