I’m so proud. This bread is made with FOUR ingredients that Nick and I produced… sort of.
The zucchinis, of course, are from my garden. Zucchini and summer squash season is in full swing and I’ve got them coming out my ears again. We were so sick of summer squash by the end of last summer that we vowed to only plant 1 or 2 of each plant this year. Well guess what? Even 1 or 2 plants produces way more than we need! So yeah… you’ll be seeing some zucchini and squash recipes in the coming months.
The pumpkin is also from my garden! Wait, wait, wait… pumpkin is a fall veggie! Yep, this pumpkin was from our fall garden. At the end of the season, after Halloween decorating was done, I took our pumpkins, baked them, then pureed them up and stuck it in the freezer in small batches. I used up most of it in muffins through the winter, and this was the last of it.
The eggs… are quail eggs from our back yard (though I’ve adjusted the recipe to regular eggs). Nick gets all the credit for this one. I’m not a huge fan of the birds (birds want nothing more than to peck your eyes out), but having a bunch of eggs on hand at all times isn’t too shabby.
So what else did we produce… or, sort-of-produce?
The honey!
A few weeks ago I logged into Nick’s Amazon account (which I share because he has Prime and I don’t!) to check on the status on one of my orders. When I clicked on “My Orders,” this is what I was greeted with:
I nearly spit out my coffee. What. The. Heck. Now those of you who know my husband know that he has a myriad of… shall we say… interesting hobbies. But really, bee keeping? I’m already terrified of the birds, now I have to deal with bees?
I wasn’t exactly surprised though, so I rolled my eyes and forgot about the awesome suit (which is definitely going to be my Halloween costume this year).
Apparently no time was wasted, because when I got home there were bee boxes in the garage and I found my husband in the kitchen with a huge mess and a stock pot full of honey! Apparently the previous owner of the bee boxes didn’t want to do the work to get the honey out, so we inherited a couple gallons of fresh, local honey.
Maybe this bee thing isn’t so bad after all. Maybe…
Anyways, that’s the story of how this bread came to bee (hehe). I guess now I just need to start growing my own wheat and grinding my own flour and I’ll never have to grocery shop again!
Healthy Pumpkin Zucchini Bread
(adapted from Organic Gardening)
- 1 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
- 1/4 tsp ground cloves
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 3 large eggs
- 1 cup pumpkin puree
- 3/4 cup honey
- 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, melted and cooled
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 2 cups shredded zucchini
Preheat oven 350 degrees. Spray a 9 x 5-inch loaf pan with nonstick spray.
In a large bowl, combine the flours, spices, salt, and baking powder and soda.
In another bowl, whisk together the eggs, pumpkin, honey, butter, and vanilla. Stir in the zucchini. Add the flour mixture to the wet mixture and stir until just combined. Pour into the loaf pan.
Bake for 60 to 70 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool on a rack for 10 minutes, then remove from the pan and cool completely.
This bread is just slightly sweet, spiced and full of good for you things like veggies, whole grains and fiber! It’s really yummy warmed up and smeared with butter and an extra drizzle of honey. It was the perfect breakfast, snack and even complement to a pasta dish! I’m sure there will be another loaf or two baked before the summer’s over!
I so love that you produced these ingredients! That is really so awesome and impressive! I love zucchini bread, I even loved it when I was a picky little kid who hated vegetables, so you know it must be good! Good luck with the bees! That sounds awesome and terrifying at the same time, haha!
It’s really neat reaping the benefits of all the hard work of gardening etc! And yeah, totally terrifying…
Wow, I’m so impressed! I don’t think I could do the beekeeping, I’m so scared of being stung. I anticipate having 800 bazillion zucchinis this year. I planted 8 of them!?! {Because I thought 1/2 of them at least would get eaten but so far none have} Lovely looking zucchini bread, will have to keep this in mind for july or august when our zuc’s start producing here in Canada 🙂
Oh my!! I’ll definitely stay tuned to your blog for zucchini ideas. Last year ours produced from June well into September so we’ve got a lot coming to us, I’m sure!
Pumpkin bread is my favorite! I love that you added zucchini in here, great way to sneak in a vegetable!
I’ve never had zucchini bread, but I bet it is good. Good luck with the bees. Have a great weekend 😉
Thanks Olivia, you too! 🙂
I want to know so much more about these bee keeping hobby! Do you keep them in the backyard? Wow, that is so neat!
And love that you can grow your own zucchini and pumpkin! Smart to puree it and freeze the pumpkin to use when you need it. We have a tiny garden, and the first year we planted 2 zucchini plants and they completely TOOK OVER! They’re leaves are huge, and they blocked the light from most other things. So we skipped them years after that. Which is too bad because they are my favorite vegetable. I just get them at the farmers market instead : )
This bread sounds delicious!
We haven’t quite figured out where to keep them yet. Our friend who we inherited the boxes from kept them on his roof. But… I don’t looooove the idea of bees on my house! We have some friends with lots of cherry trees on a lot of land, so we may put them out by them!
Zucchini plants can definitely go nutso. We didn’t want our pumpkin plant taking over the garden last year, so we just planted it in a random corner of the backyard and it did just fine! If you don’t care how it looks, I bet a zucc would do fine anywhere too! They just like to grow like crazy. 🙂
Holy cow – bees and honey and squash from last year – pretty darn impressive! Your bread sounds relish and loved your story!
Kathi
I have never baked anything with zucchini, and I am so jealous that you have them in your garden!!! This bread looks so good!
This is too funny. My husband just told me he wanted to get some bees. Thinks it would be a great business adventure for us to start making our own honey. Who knows where this will go….but I don’t think I will be telling him to go to Amazon to find his bee suit. I will kept that to myself.
Hahahaha! Yes, don’t tell him! I’ve already been stung… womp womp.
Your so talented! I do not have a green thumb! I kill everything! It is pretty much a miracle my husband and dogs are still alive! Ha! 😉
Lol! It’s taken a lot of trial and error. Last year my tomatoes completely failed. And I still can’t quite get lettuce to be successful. We started a compost bin, so having fresh compost plus access to free cow poop (from a family member’s dairy) helps. The soil/fertilizer makes a HUGE difference! Plus I live in one of the biggest agricultural areas of the country so I’ve got THAT going for me. 😉
Just took this yummy bread out of the oven. My house smells great. I used a bundt pan and cooked for 35 minutes and it seems done. Hope I didn’t screw it up.