Nick’s 4-year-old cousin Andi sent me this recipe (via Aunt Diane). Since I love any kind of quick bread– zucchini, banana, pumpkin— I had to try it.

Aunt Diane warned that I might have to “health it up” since it’s full of butter and sugar. I changed the recipe a tiny bit: cut out 1/4 of the sugar, subbed 1 cup of whole wheat flour for all purpose, and half a cup of brown sugar for white, but those changes were mostly for flavor and texture… they did very little to make this bread any healthier. Sometimes, you just gotta indulge!

Andi really enjoyed mixing the ‘kini bread batter together.

My favorite part, however, was using my brand new kitchen tool to grate the zucchinis. I don’t know why I didn’t have one of these before!

Andi’s ‘Kini Bread

• 3 eggs
• 1 cup butter, melted
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 cups shredded zucchini
• 1 small can crushed pineapple, drained
• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 cup pecans or walnuts, chopped (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Beat eggs, butter, sugars and vanilla together until thick.

Fold in flours, baking powder, soda, salt and cinnamon with a spoon.

Mix in zucchini and pineapple.

And nuts, if desired.

Pour into baking pans. The recipe said to use a 14 x 4.5 inch pan, but I’m not sure what that pan would be. So I used a normal loaf pan, and had enough left over for 4 muffins. As a general rule, fill whatever pan you use about 3/4 full. And I highly suggest sprinkling the tops with sugar. Yum.

Bake 30 minutes for muffins, 60 for loaf, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

I was happy to have the muffins since I didn’t have to wait as long to sneak a taste!

Take your pick!

This bread was super yummy… I was happy I didn’t try to make it too healthy because I was really craving a sweet, moist hunk of zucchini amazingness. Now if only I could stop eating it…