You walk through your local greengrocers and it’s full of produce. There are so many different things to choose from. There are all these squashes and zucchinis and they look gorgeous, but what do you use them for? Well, I have an idea. This is my recipe for sourdough zucchini bread.
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The zucchini bread we know and love today started it’s humble beginnings in the late 18th century.
Zucchini bread is a quick bread, which is chemically leavened, and the first commercially available chemical leavening was pearlash. The first published cookbook to use pearlash was the book American Cookery from 1796.
Pearlash wasn’t for the fainthearted though. You could taste it in whatever it was put into, and thus lots of spices were added to mask the taste.
Later in the 19th-century baking soda was invented in 1846, which requires an acidic ingredient to work. In 1857 baking powder was invented which was even easier to use, because you just needed to add it.
Because both of those are both odor and tasteless, they’ve become the go-to leavening for cakes. My recipe also requires baking soda, although I am sure one could be made using sourdough as leavening.
The ingredients in this sourdough zucchini bread recipe
Often zucchini bread is made as a pound cake with added zucchini. I really love banana bread and the texture it brings, so I’ve added banana to my zucchini bread.
It’s not so much banana that it becomes the primary taste, but it gives it a subtle sweetness that’s not sugary, plus it gives the bread an awesome texture, in my opinion.
If you don’t like (or have) bananas, you can substitute the banana with a large egg.
Not all sugars are made the same
When it comes to sugar, there’s a huge difference of what you can get from using the different types available.
In this cake, I use dark brown sugar, you know the really moist kind. The molasses that’s added to the sugar just gives it a distinctive and very complex taste and that really adds to the spices of this cake.
Additional ingredients?
This is a good base recipe for zucchini bread.
Depending on what you are looking for you can easily add nuts (walnuts or pecans come to mind). Chocolate chips would also be delicious.
You could also sprinkle some coarse sugar on top to give it a wonderful crunch.
I am sure you can come up with many more great things to add. Feel free to post comments below on your best things to add to this zucchini bread.
The conclusion of this sourdough zucchini bread recipe
Nobody likes dry cake. Least of all Paul Hollywood.
The addition of the zucchini and the sourdough starter makes this the least dry cake you’ve ever tried. That means that it stays good for many days if you just store it correctly.
I usually use a ziplock bag, but you can also wrap it tightly in tinfoil and it will keep.
The taste of this bread (or cake) is delicious. The spices are just the right amount, and the complexity from the brown sugar and the fermented (but not sour) taste of the starter makes it an absolute treat.
I eat mine with a good layer of butter and a cup of well-brewed coffee. That takes me straight to culinary heaven.
Please share this recipe for sourdough zucchini bread on social media
This is my recipe for sourdough zucchini bread. If you like the recipe please consider sharing it with like-minded bread lovers on social media.
If you make it and post it on Instagram, please tag me as @foodgeek.dk so I can see it. That would make me very happy.
* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.
Wonderfully moist and full-flavored zucchini bread with lots of warm spices and fermented flavor. This is the best zucchini bread recipe you will ever find.
Ingredients
100gbanana(1 small banana)
225gbrown sugar
1½teaspoonpure vanilla extract
2large eggs
100gsourdough discard
250gall-purpose flour
1teaspooncinnamon
⅛teaspoonnutmeg
1½teaspoonbaking soda
¼teaspoontable salt
60gmilkor non dairy milk
125gneutral flavored oil
225gzucchini, grated(1 medium zucchini)
Instructions
Heat your oven to 180°C/360°F.
Grate a medium zucchini coarsely and put it in a bowl. You need 250g. Put it aside until you need it.
To the bowl of your standmix add: 100g very ripe banana, 225g of brown sugar and 1½ tsp vanilla extract.
Mix with the paddle attachment until thoroughly combined. The banana should be mostly gone.
While mixing, add 2 eggs, one whole egg at a time, and mix until it's combined. Mix a bit longer to get some air into the mixture.
Add 100g sourdough starter and mix for a short time until combined.
Add 250g all-purpose flour, 1 tsp cinnamon, ⅛ tsp nutmeg, 1½ tsp baking soda and ¼ tsp table salt. Mix it together with a whisk.
While mixing, add the spiced flour to the batter in two increments. Mix shortly after each addition.
Add 60g milk and 125g of neutral flavored oil and mix until it's just combined.
Add the grated zucchini on top and fold it in using a spatula.
Butter or spray a medium Pullman pan, and add all of the batter.
Put the pan on a wire rack set to the middle position in the oven.
Bake for about 60 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
Take the bread out of the oven and let it cool in the pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes.
Remove the bread from the pan and let it cool completely before serving.
