Sneaky Chef: Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

I purposely bought zucchini because I wanted to make muffins. Actually, I really wanted to make muffins AND mock-apple pie using zucchini, but I totally chickened out and only made the muffins. And I was too busy to make them right away while the zucchini was fresh, so I ended up shredding and freezing the zucchini so I could use it later.  Frozen zucchini is really watery, but I love having it around to unobtrusively throw into dishes.   

My ingredients lineup,
that's shredded zucchini in the bag in the back left.

Inspiration

Cooking Light Kathie's zucchini muffins

I originally had a different recipe selected, but after I read several unfavorable reviews, I switched to this one, which had lots of great reviews and a lower calorie count.  

Sonny D said he wanted chocolate muffins, so I added 2/3 cup cocoa powder based on this King Arthur Flour chocolate breakfast muffins recipe.  And since I was making them into chocolate muffins, I skipped the cinnamon-sugar topping.

I think I used more zucchini than the recipe called for, I just used everything I had in the bag.  

Ingredients

makes 12 muffins

• 7.75 ounces whole-wheat flour 
• 1/2 cup sugar 
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2/3 cup cocoa powder
• 1 1/3 cups shredded zucchini
• 1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk milk 
• 2 tablespoons canola oil 
• 2 tablespoons honey 
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 large egg

Directions

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

In a medium-size bowl mix the dry ingredients -- flour through cocoa powder.  In a large bowl mix the wet ingredients -- zucchini through the egg.  Then add the dry mixture to the wet mixture and gently stir only until just combined.  

Chocolate-y batter

Look closely for the green zucchini shreds hiding in there.

Divide the batter into a standard muffin pan and bake for 15 minutes.

beautiful chocolate muffin

Verdict 

Chocolatey goodness with surprise vegetables to nourish you. 

I ended up being the only one who ate these.  Sonny D was excited to try a muffin, but that excitement didn't last long and he didn't finish it.  Husband Jeff said there was too much cinnamon, that was all he could taste, so maybe that's what turned Sonny D off.  My cinnamon is quite strong (Penzey's Tung Hing), and I always forget that.  Maybe I should have also let the cocoa powder bloom a bit longer to hydrate and develop a more chocolatey flavor.

I was really hoping Sonny D would like these so I could kind of "trick" him into eating vegetables because he doesn't really like to eat them.  But it wasn't much of a "trick" since he helped me make these and saw me add the zucchini. He was still excited to eat the muffin, I think he doesn't connect the vegetables with the finished product.  It's the same as when we make a smoothie in the morning and he adds the spinach to the cup.  It's super green but he'll eat it. 

I took one of these to work each day for my morning snack and loved them.  I had to freeze the last few because I wasn't eating them fast enough before they would spoil. When I brought the frozen ones to work, they were perfectly defrosted in time to eat at 10 a.m. 

I liked the base recipe and would love to try it as written instead of adding cocoa.  And of course reduce the cinnamon.