By theI know, I know. Zucchini brownies... gross, right? But I promise if I didn't tell you these had zucchini in them, you'd never know. Intrigued? So was I.
Do you ever do that thing where you see a recipe that you think sounds good, so you dive right in without really looking at the recipe? I do that all the time. As long as I have the ingredients on hand, I'll totally be half-way through a recipe when suddenly I'm going,
"Wait, this calls for HOW much sugar?!" or "Holy... two sticks of butter!! What the crap!"
But by then I'm in too deep and can't back down. (Goonies never say die!)
So, I thought making brownies that called for zucchini as a main ingredient was totally legit and possibly even healthy. Therefore, I barely even glanced at the other ingredients.
Possibly a mistake.
These brownies, while sinfully delicious, are also packed with sugar and oil and butter, and once again I was half-way through making them before seeing the exact amounts. (Whoops.)
Still, I can't deny they're yummy and you'll want to eat the whole pan in one sitting.
You have been warned.
{zucchini brownies}
Ingredients:
½ cup vegetable oil (I wonder if I could try applesauce as a substitute next time?)
1 ½ cups white sugar
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups zucchini (shredded)
Chocolate Frosting:
6 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
¼ cup margarine
2 cups confectioners sugar
½ cup milk
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9×13 inch baking dish.
In a large bowl mix together oil, sugar and vanilla extract until blended.
In another bowl combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt. A little at a time stir into the sugar mixture. Mix in the zucchini. (The batter will be dry and crumbly at this point.)
By the way, as I was shredding up my zucchini, I pulled two of them out of this week's food drop and was halfway through the second one when I realized it wasn't a zucchini, but a cucumber. Oops... well played, cucumber. Well played.
Spread the mixture evenly into the prepared baking dish. You may have to pat it down. It looks kind of strange at this point, but it does eventually make brownies, so hang in there!
Place into the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes. It's difficult to tell when they are done, but I took mine out when I touched the top of them and they felt a little spongey. At 20 minutes the tops of the brownies still caved in a little when prodded, so I left them in a little longer.
To make the frosting: In a small saucepan over low heat melt together the cocoa powder and margarine. Set aside to cool. In a medium bowl blend confectioner’s sugar, milk, and vanilla extract. Stir in the margarine/cocoa mixture.
Spread over cooled brownies and cut into squares.
By the way, I recommend putting the brownie pan in the fridge for a few hours. It helps the frosting to harden and makes them much easier to cut into squares.
The zucchini smells weird when the brownies are baking, but once they're cool, you can't even taste it. (Tanner even ate some, and we all know how he hates green things.)
In fact, you'll probably be so bowled over by the amount of sugar in these things that you'll completely forget that there are two whole cups of veggies in there, too.
Did someone say these were healthy brownies? Yeah.... about that....
I also would advise against eating these right before bed. I may or may not have done this three nights in a row. I don't recommend it. ;)
