ultimate zucchini bread – smitten kitchen

I have a few complaints about zucchini bread and I bet you cannot wait to hear them. I bet you were thinking “I was hoping to hear more complaining today than I usually do.” Or, “Wow, Deb is really going hard on the zucchini content this summer, isn’t she?” It’s all fair — and true. But if you, like me, couldn’t help but notice that a lot of zucchini bread recipes could be better, well, pull up a chair, you’re among friends.

The first thing that I’ve never understood about 90% of zucchini bread recipes out there — including my own earlier one — is why they make two loaves, but two squat ones. Why do we settle for this when we’d rather have one great one? Can’t we decide for our own selves when the time is right to scale it up to two? I like loaf cakes that are filled out and domed; I like craggy, crunchy tops you have to constantly swat hands away from picking off in bark-like flecks, usually failing, but who can really blame anyone.

I’ve never understood why zucchini bread doesn’t have more zucchini in it. Is it because “cake with a few disparate flecks of zucchini in it” is less intimidating? Is it because “cake with a substantial amount of vegetables inside” doesn’t rally the base? My goal was never to replace my salad quota with zucchini bread, but the presence of zucchini actually makes for a better, more tender, cake. We should embrace it.

Some recipes tell you to grate zucchini just to wring it out, which, to me, is a monstrous extra step. This style of cake is called a quickbread; I take the “quick” to heart, and I see no reason to dry out your zucchini when the moisture within it is what makes zucchini bread great. Also, every recipe that tells you to grate “one zucchini” should be cancelled. Zucchini can range from a few ounces to a couple pounds and I doubt any recipe could use both interchangeably.

I like one-bowl cakes. I don’t think anyone making zucchini bread is hoping to get all fancy with it. What if you could just mix it with an electric mixer, no wait, a whisk, no wait, a fork? I want want more fork-mixed cakes. It’s homey food; it should be hurdle-free.

Finally, every single recipe, including my earlier one, lies to you when it fails to tell you that the best time to eat zucchini bread is one day after you make it. While this is true for many cakes, for zucchini bread, the difference is so significant, it should be nonnegotiable. I also think we need to talk about how to wrap it so it’s not compromised in any way when you eat it tomorrow. I hope you’re ready for this: we’re not going to. If you wrap it, you lose the crisp top — why achieve it just to give it up? I have not found the moisture of zucchini bread to be notably compromised by keeping it unwrapped on top, especially not with this recipe. But I do leave it in the pan; this is all the protection it needs.

The result, the one you see here, the one I’ve been tweaking now for two summers and am finally happy enough to share it with you, is my zucchini bread best-in-show, is my zucchini bread mic-drop. It’s clutter-free — you can schmear chocolate or sweetened cream cheese or salted butter on top, where it has the most impact. It’s tall, so crunchy you can rap on it like a loaf of bread, and epic, with two full cups of packed zucchini inside. I hope it’s the last zucchini bread recipe you ever need.

Elsewhere: In the NYT this week, I talking about meal planning strategies for real life and they sent a photographer over to take pictures of my sous-chefs and I cooking dinner. I’m a little biased, but it was pretty cute.