Zucchini Bread Recipe – from our Garden to the Table

This year our garden has been flourishing with all the heat (90+ degrees), and our zucchini's are an excellent example of how good our garden has been to us! My sons suddenly get really involved when the garden started producing the fruits from my labor. :) Every year, we take pictures with our kids and the zucchini's – just to show how good/bad of a year it is. Funny thing is our kids keep getting bigger, but the zucchini's stay about the size. 

This year I planted four zucchini plants, two cherry tomatoes, one jalapeno plant, a row of carrots, and three rows of sweet corn(can't take the Iowa out of this boy) in our small 8′ x 8′ raised garden. In the spring, my wife and I were going back and forth on whether I planted the zucchini plants too close together (or too many of them). You be the judge…personally I don't see a problem here.

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This year I supervised my oldest son while I let him dice up the zucchini, and he really enjoyed being more involved in the process. Because my oldest was so excited, it spurred my middle son to get involved too, and he got to help bag the zucchini. He was pretty proud of himself and our two large zucchini's produced four bags (2 cups each). This is our first batch, so we should be able to freeze a lot more throughout the summer. Plus, it's always nice to be generous and share with the neighbors!

Here are the steps we take to prep our zucchini for freezing, and our family recipe.

• Carefully cut the zucchini from vine
• Take pictures of your first fruits (optional):)
• Rinse
• Cut in half vertically
• Take a spoon and core out some of the seeds
• Cut up the zucchini that is left into small chunks to be put into your food processor (you could also grate it if you don't have a food processor)
• Let the food processor do its thing.
• Put 2 cups of diced zucchini into quart sized freezer bags
• Freeze and label bag with date

Zucchini Bread Recipe

• 3 Eggs
• 1 cup oil (canola or vegetable)
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 cups zucchini
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 3 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 cups nuts (chopped) (optional)

Grind zucchini with skin on. Beat together with first 5 ingredients. Sift and add remaining ingredients. Stir in nuts. Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour.

Nothing better then warm zucchini bread with butter on it, and a tall glass of milk! It's always fun to see your garden turn into real food that you enjoy.

What are you raising in your garden this year? Do you have a good recipe to share?

You might also be interested in:

• How to Grow Pounds of Food in a Tiny Garden
• Thrifty Green Planting: Annuals
• How to Start a Community Garden
• How to Can Pickled Beets
• How to Prepare for a Great Depression