Chocolate Zucchini Cake - by Summer

Hi - anyone still here? As mentioned, we still want to keep this blog going, but it sure was nice to take a little break.  I decided to take a month off from baking.  I made a couple of things here and there, but the weather has been crazy hot, so I haven't even wanted to turn on the oven!

Summer time also means garden time! It's great to have fresh veggies, but quite often it seems like you end up with lots of stuff that you just don't know what to do! Zucchini can be one of those very things! I've made zucchini bread in the past, but really wanted something "sweeter"! I had this recipe in my desserts binder for a very long time. It's one that I typed up from somewhere, but have no idea where it originally came from!  A neighbor gave me a lot of zucchini and I thought it would be fun to try this cake.  It has chocolate in it, and it's a cake - how can you go wrong?  I also happened to have everything on hand, well, almost everything.  The recipe calls for sour milk.  If you don't have sour milk - I included a how to make your own (very easy).

I don't think I baked this quite long enough.  It was very moist - maybe too much so.  My husband thought it reminded him of a date cake that his mom used to make.  He thought it actually was baked long enough. It also needed more chocolate! While you have the cocoa in the cake part - I wanted more.  There are chocolate chips in the topping, but next time I will add them to the cake mixture. Unfortunately I took no pictures of this!  I was tempted to make again, since I still have zucchini, but I really don't need to eat more of it right now.  I will definitely make again because it was easy and yummy and it's gotta be healthy with the zucchini in it, right?

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

½ cup butter

½ cup oil

1 ¾ cup sugar

2 eggs 1 teaspoon vanilla

½ cup sour milk*

1 ½ cup flour

4 tablespoons cocoa

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon cinnamon

2/3 teaspoon salt

2 cup peeled, shredded zucchini

Cream oil, butter and sugar.  Add eggs and vanilla.  Beat.  Sift dry ingredients together.  Add alternately with sour milk.  Mix in the zucchini.  Spread into a 9x13 inch pan.  Top with the topping (below).

Topping:

¼ cup chocolate chips

¼ cup brown sugar

¼ cup chopped nuts

Mix and sprinkle over top of unbaked cake.  Bake at 350 for 40 minutes.

*to make sour milk add 1/2 teaspoon of vinegar to 1/2 cup of milk. Stir and let sit for 15 min. You can also use lemon juice in place of vinegar.

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