Zucchini Lemon Poppy Seed Bread

Moist, lemony perfection! This bread has a bright flavor and soft texture. It's perfect for summer or when you need a touch of brightness in the winter! A great way to use zucchini if you're drowning in it from your garden. My mom's zucchinis are rapidly growing to 1 1/2 to 2 feet long!

The recipe is here, and pictures of the process are below

Recipe:

Ingredients:

• 3 cups all-purpose flour

• 1 teaspoon salt

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• 1 teaspoon baking powder

• 2 Tbsp. poppy seeds

• 6 oz. Greek Yogurt (lemon or vanilla)

• 2 cups granulated sugar

• Zest of 2 large lemons (about 1 heaping Tbsp.)

• 2 large eggs

• 1/2 cup vegetable oil or melted (and cooled) butter

• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

• 2 cups grated zucchini (don't use old dry zucchini)

Glaze:

• ~2 1/2 cups powdered sugar

• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

• 1 Tbsp. heavy cream

• 1 Tbsp. softened butter

• 1/8 tsp. salt

• 1 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees and coat 4 6x2" bread pans with butter and flour.

• Finely zest 2 large lemons.

• In a medium sized bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, baking soda, poppy seeds, salt. Set aside.

• In a large bowl, cream together oil (or melted and cooled butter), Greek yogurt, lemon juice, lemon zest, and sugar. Once combined, add in eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Then mix in vanilla extract.

• Add dry ingredients into wet ingredients, and mix just until combined.

• Add in zucchini and stir until distributed.

• Divide batter evenly between the two bread pans.

• Bake for 35-45 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

• Allow to cool at least 10-20 minutes before removing from the pan and placing on a cooling rack.

• To make the glaze, mix all the ingredients for the glaze together. Add more powdered sugar until you're glaze is the consistency of molasses.

• With the bread on the cooling rack, pour glaze over the bread.

• Store in an airtight container up to 3 days at room temperature, or for 7 days in a refrigerator (in a container).

• 4 loaves.

How to prep a large zucchini for shredding:

Place your zucchini on a cutting board.

Cut off the stem and bottom of the zucchini.

Cut the zucchini in half, revealing the core.

Use a spoon to scrape out the soft inner core, which holds the seeds. Discard the core (or compost or feed to animals :)

Your zucchini should now look like this.

Cut to desired sizes for shredding. You will not use more than 2 cups of shredded zucchini for this recipe. However, you can refrigerate shredded/unshredded zucchini up to 4 days and you can freeze shredded zucchini up to 3 months.

My zucchini is coarsely shred, but you can shred it more finely if desired.

Lemon and pan preparation:

Zest 2 large lemons using a fine shredder.

The zest should look like this.

Then juice your lemons using your desired method (discarding the seeds).

Now let's prep the pans. First I greased them with soft butter.

Then I lightly coated the inside with flour. To do this, add ~ 1 Tbsp. to each pan and tilt it around until coated (adding more flour as necessary and discarding excess flour as necessary).

Making the batter:

Before mixing together the eggs, sugar, lemon juice, lemon zest, yogurt, and oil/butter.

After mixing together the ingredients.

Dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, baking powder, and poppy seeds) have been mixed together!

Now it's time to mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients gradually.

After mixing the dry into the wet. Next to add the zucchini and we'll be done!

After mixing in the shredded zucchini. Now we're ready to roll!

Filled the greased and floured pans about 3/4 of the way full.

After baking!

While the loaves are cooling, make the glaze.

Prep the loaves for glazing by putting a wire rack over saran wrap/parchment paper. This makes for easier cleanup.

Glazed loaves (feel free to add more coats when the first one dries!)