Always on the lookout for a great new recipe to try, I stumbled across this lemon zucchini loaf last week on Pinterest. I’m going to go ahead and put this out there because I’m not ashamed of it, but I LOVE ZUCCHINI BREAD. Specifically, I love my mom’s zucchini bread. And more specifically, I love my mom’s zucchini bread fresh out of the oven, slathered in butter, but since I don’t eat butter, I’ll slather mine in Earth Balance. And, apparently, there is a zucchini bread affinity gene I’ve passed on to my daughter, too, because I wrote about her affection for my mother’s baking wonder here. Given the choice, we would want to eat the entire loaf in one sitting.
No pressure, Lemon-Zucchini Loaf, but I had high expectations coming into the kitchen with you. I bought extra lemons and a couple of zucchini because what if you’re amazing, and I might just need to bake more than one of you?! Yeah, not gonna happen.
I didn’t like it, and have no intention of repeating the recipe, but the other tasters in the room loved it. It definitely had a lemon zing, and a nice texture. The lemon glaze was super tasty (how could it not be – powdered sugar and lemon juice – whip it up, folks, and drizzle THAT on anything).
In the end, I realized that what I really wanted was zucchini bread. Straight up. Hot out of the oven. Thick slices. Leftovers in the morning. What I got was a very tasty loaf bread that bore no resemblance whatsoever to the zucchini bread of my childhood, but mostly to a lemon bread recipe I found online that came without recommendation.
I gave away all that remained of the loaf because sometimes you have to let things go like that. I have no regrets.
Lemon-Zucchini Loaf with Lemon Glaze
You'll need buttermilk for this recipe! Here's the way to do that: Mix 1 cup of your unsweetened non-dairy milk (soy, almond, rice, coconut) with 2 T of either lemon juice or vinegar. Allow it to stand for a few minutes, and then voila! You've got yourself one cup of buttermilk.
Ingredients:
- All-purpose or Whole Wheat Flour - 2 cups
- Baking Powder - 2 tsp
- Salt - 1/2 tsp
- Ground Flax Seed - 2 T
- Water - 6 T
- Canola Oil - 1/2 cup
- Sugar - 2/3 cup
- Buttermilk - 1/2 cup
- Fresh Lemon Juice - Juice of 1 lemon (2 T)
- Lemon Zest - 1 lemon
- Grated Zucchini - 1 c
Instructions:
Makes one 9×5″ loaf
Preheat oven to 35o degrees. Grease and flour a 9×5″ loaf pan; set aside.
In large bowl, blend flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside.
In medium bowl, mix the ground flax seed with the water (this is your egg replacement), then add canola oil and sugar, and blend well. Next add the buttermilk, lemon juice, and lemon zest and blend everything well. Fold in zucchini and stir until evenly distributed in mixture.
Add this mixture to the dry ingredients in the large bowl and stir everything together, but don’t over-mix.
Pour batter into prepared 9×5″ loaf pan and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean (if your oven tends to run hot, check the loaf after 40 minutes; also, if you make this in an 8×4″ loaf pan, your baking time may be a little longer…about 5 to 10 minutes more). Cool in pan 10 minutes, then remove to a wire rack and cool completely. While loaf is cooling, you can make the glaze…
LEMON GLAZE
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- Juice of 1 lemon (or 2 Tablespoons lemon juice)
In small bowl, mix powdered sugar and lemon juice until well blended. Spoon glaze over cooled loaf. Let glaze set, then serve. Or just drizzle while it's hot and eat it as the glaze melts into the bread. It's all good.
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