Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread

This recipe from Gina's Skinny Recipes for Low Fat Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread is a wonderful one. I thought about not posting it since my photo isn't the greatest but it is healthy, low fat & delicious so needed to share :)

Low Fat Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread
from Gina's Skinny Recipes at skinnytaste.com

* 1 cup all purpose flour
* 1 cup white whole wheat flour
* 1/2 cup brown sugar (not packed)
* 1-1/8 tsp baking soda
* 1 tsp vanilla
* 1/2 tsp salt
* 1/2 cup chocolate chips
* 1 large egg, beaten
* 2 tbsp melted butter
* 1 cup apple sauce
* 1-1/2 cups shredded zucchini (not packed)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 325°. Combine flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Mix well.
Add chocolate chips and gently mix to combine. In a medium bowl, mix egg, vanilla, melted butter, apple sauce and zucchini. Add to the flour mixture and stir until just blended. Pour
batter into a large 9x5 inch loaf pan. Bake at 325° for 45-55 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool for about 10 minutes. Remove loaf from pan and let it cool before slicing.

My notes: I added a teaspoon of cinnamon to the batter because my old recipe (which used a cup of oil!) had that and we like the taste of cinnamon & chocolate. The whole wheat flour I use is Bob's Red Mill Whole Wheat Pastry Flour which I find in the health food section of my grocery store. It comes in 5 lb bags and the WW pastry flour is much finer ground than the WW flour found in the baking aisle. I use it by substituting it for 1/2 of the white flour in most recipes as part of our quest to become more healthy.

Marsha - Thumbs UP
Jeff - Thumbs UP

CSA veggies...chickpea salad

We are eating an abundance of veggies these days thanks to my weekly CSA deliveries, it is more than 2 people can eat in a week so I am learning to blanch and freeze a few veggies for this winter. Since I am always looking for new recipes, I immediately bookmarked this recipe for chickpea salad on my friend, Carol, There's Always Thyme to Cook's blog. She wrote it was her son's favorite but that he wanted her to hold the carrots next time :) I think we would love the carrot addition but since we haven't received any carrots in our basket yet, I refuse to buy vegetables when I can hardly eat all the ones I have :)
I halved all the ingredients on this first try of this recipe because I knew Jeff would question the chickpeas so it made a smaller batch. We served it with grilled veggies (cut up asst. veggies tossed with olive oil, salt, pepper, fresh chopped rosemary & garlic) and steaks.


Chickpea Salad as copied from Carol's blog.
Source: T @ the Deli
adapted by There's Always Thyme to Cook

2 cans chickpeas, rinsed and drained
1 hothouse cucumber, diced (washed and seeded, not peeled)
1 red pepper, diced
1/2 small red onion, diced
1 carrot, shredded (optional)
little bit chopped parsley

Dressing:
approximate, it's all to taste, more or less!

1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil (more or less to taste, we like more vinegar than oil)
salt and pepper to taste
1 teaspoon granulated garlic
salt and freshly ground pepper

Mix the dressing in a jar and shake to combine. Pour over the vegetables, mix well, and chill in the frig for a bit. Serve.

My Notes: I halved the recipe with good success. We had green pepper on hand so I used that instead of a red one. This one is a keeper - Thanks Carol!

Marsha - Thumbs UP
Jeff - Thumbs UP

ice cream social time...

It's July so once again that means it is time for my friend, Suzy of Kitchen Bouquet's ice cream social. Head over to her post HERE to see almost 30 versions of ice cream from the participants as well as some ice cream history and beautiful ice cream sandwiches from Suzy. It's very hot here in MN with heat advisories so ice cream was a perfect treat to make this weekend.
I chose to make rocky road ice cream which is one of my very favorite flavors and I have made this eggless version from allrecipes.com before and we both really liked it. (sorry no photos that time)

This weekend I decided to do the custard base version and chose a recipe from Fine Cooking. I made a few modifications to the original recipe based on what I had on hand and my attempt at a shortcut that wasn't very successful.
Rocky Road Ice Cream
by David Lebovitz as copied from finecooking.com
2 cups heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
3/4 cup granulated sugar
Table salt
5 large egg yolks
4 oz. bittersweet chocolate (at least 60% cacao), chopped and melted
1/4 cup Dutch-processed cocoa
1/3 cup mini marshmallows
1/3 cup toasted chopped pecans
1/3 cup bite-size chocolate chunks

In a medium saucepan, mix 1 cup of the cream with the milk, sugar, and a pinch of salt. Warm the cream mixture over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, until the sugar dissolves and tiny bubbles begin to form around the edge of the pan, 3 to 4 minutes.

Prepare an ice bath by filling a large bowl with several inches of ice water. Set a smaller metal bowl (one that holds at least 1-1/2 quarts) in the ice water. Pour the remaining cup of cream into the inner bowl (this helps the custard cool quicker when you pour it in later). Set a fine strainer on top. Whisk the egg yolks in a medium bowl.

In a steady stream, pour half of the warm cream mixture into the egg yolks, whisking constantly to prevent the eggs from curdling.

Pour the egg mixture back into the saucepan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly and scraping the bottom with a heatproof rubber spatula until the custard thickens slightly (it should be thick enough to coat the spatula and hold a line drawn through it with a finger), 4 to 8 minutes. An instant-read thermometer should read 175° to 180°F at this point. Don’t let the sauce overheat or boil, or it will curdle.

Immediately strain the custard into the cold cream in the ice bath. Stir in the melted chocolate and cocoa powder. Cool the custard to below 70°F by stirring it over the ice bath.

Refrigerate the custard until completely chilled, at least 4 hours. Then freeze the custard in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

Fold the marshmallows, pecans, and chocolate chunks into the just-churned ice cream, transfer to an air-tight container, and freeze for at least 4 hours or up to 2 weeks.

My Notes: I didn't have whole milk so I used the regular skim milk we always have on hand. Figured it had enough fat it in with all the cream & egg yolks anyway. Secondly, I made the custard at 9 pm at night and wasn't in the mood to go through all the steps with having an ice bath, I also thought "why can't I melt my chopped chocolate in the warm custard?" but obviously this was a big mistake. The chocolate melted for the most part but there were small bits (like coffee grounds) throughout the ice cream. While this didn't make the ice cream the best looking it didn't affect the taste. I also substituted marshmallow cream for the miniature marshmallows because that is how we prefer it (I also use the same substitution in the allrecipes version). While this ice cream was delicious as the person making it, I prefer the simple allrecipes version.

Marsha - Thumbs UP
Jeff - Thumbs UP

Simple holiday dessert...

We spent lots of time with family & friends this weekend so another dessert I made to bring to a BBQ is red/white/blue cake balls displayed to look like a flag. What are cake balls?? - Bake a 9 x 13 cake of any flavor of your choosing. This one was a dark chocolate one. Using your CLEAN hands, crumble the baked & cooled cake into into a large bowl and mix with one can of premade frosting of your choice. I used dark chocolate. Mix well with your spatula and then take spoonfuls of the mixture and roll into balls. Freeze until firm and then dip into melted Wilton chocolate melts - the color of your choice. Easy Peasy Dessert and was very popular at 2 gatherings this weekend.

Happy Holiday weekend!

My it has been a long time since I posted here - life has been busy and computer time sometimes falls to the wayside but I'm catching up and hope to start sharing more new recipe with you soon. I'm also excited to share what I make each week out of my CSA garden box and this past week we received our 2nd delivery but the first one that included actual produce. Minnesota had a very wet & late spring so all gardens are behind. Our first delivery was 2 farm raised broiler chickens and a herb planter and the above was our delivery this week.

Of course since this is a holiday weekend, we decided it was okay to take a break from our healthy eating and splurge a little with those fresh strawberries we received :)

Orzo and Wild Rice

I'm behind on blogging but recently we tried a new recipe for Orzo and Wild Rice from the blog of a MN food writer.
It was a tasty and colorful dish so I served in on some colorful new dishes :)


Orzo & Wild Rice
from Sue Doeden's blog, All About Food
Orzo and Wild Rice

* 1 cup wild rice, uncooked
* 1/2 cup orzo, uncooked
* 1 medium onion, chopped
* 1/2 of a red bell pepper, chopped
* 1/2 of a yellow bell pepper, chopped
* 2 cloves garlic, minced
* 2 tablespoons butter
* 2 tablespoons honey
* 1 tablespoon chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley or 1 teaspoon dried parsley
* 2 teaspoons reduced-sodium soy sauce
* 2 teaspoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

Cook orzo according to package directions. Rinse wild rice and put in saucepan with 3 cups water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer, covered until rice is done. Kernels of will be split open, revealing the white inside. It should be tender, but still a bit chewy. Drain and set aside.

Saute onion and bell peppers in 2 tablespoons butter in large pan. When tender, add garlic and saute another minute. Stir in honey. Add wild rice, parsley, orzo, soy sauce and lemon juice. Stir in cooked wild rice and orzo, continuing to stir until heated through. Serve immediately. Makes 6 very generous servings

This was a good side dish. We had it the first time with baked fish and fresh bread and the leftovers were frozen. We had it the second time as the rice base for orange chicken and it was wonderful then as well.

Marsha - Thumbs UP
Jeff - Thumbs UP

St. Patrick's Day blog crawl...

Welcome!

Today, I am joining my friend Kathleen for her 3rd annual St. Patrick's Day blog crawl. Please click HERE to go to her blog, Cuisine Kathleen, and see all the other blogs participating.
I didn't have time to make the Irish treats that her party deserves, but I did set a simple tabled themed for the day.
I love these new black/white checked plates I found at Goodwill so you will probably be seeing them often in future posts. A black tablecloth, shamrock scarf and a candle holder hung with shamrocks and leprechaun hats (found at Michael's) are about as Irish as this post goes.
I did make dessert though - Meyer Lemon Buttermilk Sherbet.
I found the recipe for Grapefruit-Buttermilk Sherbet in the January 2011 issue of Cooking Light magazine and switched out Meyer Lemons for the Grapefruit.

Grapefruit-Buttermilk Sherbet
recipe from Cooking Light January 2011
Yield: 8 servings (serving size: about 2/3 cup)


1 cup water
2 tablespoons finely chopped red grapefruit rind
1 cup sugar
1 cup fresh red grapefruit juice
2 cups whole buttermilk
2 tablespoons vodka

1. Bring 1 cup water to a boil in a small saucepan. Add rind to pan; reduce heat, and simmer for 2 minutes. Drain, reserving rind. Combine rind, sugar, and juice in pan; bring to a boil, stirring constantly until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat, and simmer 20 minutes. Remove from heat; pour into a bowl. Chill for 1 hour. Strain juice mixture, and discard solids. Combine the juice mixture, buttermilk, and vodka in the freezer can of an ice-cream freezer; freeze according to manufacturer's instructions.

My notes - I made as directed except for substituting the lemons.

Marsha - Thumbs partially UP (I thought the buttermilk flavor was not to my taste)
Jeff - Thumbs down