Secret Ingredient Rich Chocolate Cake Recipe
 Why is this man smiling and cuddling a giant zucchini squash? Because he knows it will soon be a delicious chocolate cake. More specifically, it will be a chocolate chip zucchini cake, baked from scratch.
This is my husband, Doug, holding a homegrown organic zucchini that weighs close to 20 pounds.
He just harvested it from our tiny backyard veggie patch, and he knew that just an hour from when this photo was taken he would have this baseball bat sized green squash transformed into a deliciously moist dark chocolate cake ... yes, chocolate cake.
Chocolate Zucchini Cake - Healthy Dessert!
Make your double chocolate zucchini cake with olive oil to boost the heart-healthy properties.
If you've tried my mother in law's famous home made chocolate cake recipe (Hattie's Chocolate Cake) you know her secret ingredient for boosting the chocolate intensity is a bit of coffee added to the batter.
This absolutely delicious chocolate cake recipe also uses coffee - either freshly brewed and cooled or instant granules. Either way the flavor of the coffee won't be detectable any more than the zucchini. Both ingredients improve the flavor and texture of a good basic chocolate cake.
The zucchini also gives this cake a big dose of nutritional value - how can you say this cake isn't healthy when it has 4 cups of organic green vegetables baked right in?
Almost anyone who grows zucchini squash has tales to tell about how prolific and how gigantic zucchini squash can grow. If you have abundant zucchini and love chocolate, your green squash is the secret ingredient in this chocolate zucchini cake. Maybe you won't have to sneak those zucchini onto your neighbor's porch next summer!
Grated, fresh zucchini is the secret ingredient that makes this dark chocolate cake dense and moist, but you'll never detect it in the finished product. All you will taste is all the delicious chocolate goodness and sweet nuggets of dark chocolate chunks in this moist and utterly decadent chocolate chip zucchini cake.
Got a garden glut of zucchini? Make a chocolate chip zucchini cake. You don't even need to add frosting or icing - it's that good!
Double Chocolate Zucchini Cake Recipe
This recipe is so versatile and forgiving if you need to substitute ingredients. You can use brown sugar or white sugar. You can use olive oil or butter. It's low-fat because the grated zucchini is a fat-replacer in this recipe. You'll get a moist and flavorful cake with less fat than traditional butter cakes without any loss of texture or toothfulness.
And of course you can bake the batter as cupcakes or muffins instead of a large cake! Reduce the baking time to 20-30 minutes if you make muffins and be sure to test for doneness.
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 40 min
Ready in: 1 hour
Yields: Approximately 24 servings
Ingredients
4 cups sifted flour
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
2 cups sugar (brown or white)
1 cup soft butter or oil
2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 Tablespoons strong coffee cooled OR 2 tsp. instant coffee granules
6 eggs
4 cups grated zucchini unpeeled and seeded. (About 3 medium or 1 gigantic squash.)
2 cups chocolate chips or chopped semi-sweet chocolate. We like 70% cacao dark chocolate chips.
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350° (If using a glass baking dish, reduce heat by 25 degrees.)
Grease a 13" x 9" baking pan and dust with cocoa powder.
Mix dry ingredients together in a medium size bowl.
Cream sugar and butter (or oil) until fluffy. Add vanilla, coffee and eggs separately, beating well after each to create egg batter.
In a separate bowl, mix together grated zucchini, chocolate chips and 1/3 of the flour mixture. Keep zucchini strands from clumping and be sure to coat them well.
Add remaining flour mixture into the egg batter and mix just until combined. Batter will be thick.
Fold zucchini mixture into batter and blend gently with large spoon or spatula just until combined. Don't over mix, don't beat.
Pour batter into cake pan or muffin tins lined with papers.
Bake 40 to 50 minutes until knife inserted into center comes out clean.
Cool pan on baking rack for 10 minutes, then run knife around outer edges.
Cool to warm or room temperature; cut into squares and serve with a dusting of confectionery sugar or dollop of whipped cream.
Printable Recipe
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