Zucchini Muffins

Had a huge zucchini from the garden I wanted to use up so tweaked my favorite Mom's Zucchini Bread Recipe to make a bit healthier and I also wanted to make muffins for some super quick breakfasts and snacks because I decided even cutting a slice of bread and eating from a plate feels like just too much work sometimes. This recipe can make about 6 dozen small muffins, or it can make two (maybe 3 depending on your pan size) loaves of bread. I made 27 muffins and one loaf of bread. My kids love picking veggies from our garden and find it absolutely thrilling to actually eat or help cook with the very thing they've watched grow outside and picked themselves. But if it's a battle to get your kids to eat their veggies, this is a great way to sneak them in because these are sweet and tasty enough that they won't even know they are in there. I think a crunchy brown sugar crumb topping would also taste really good on these, but I opted to leave out the extra calories on this batch.

What You Will Need:

- 3 cups grated zucchini (about 1 large zucchini or 3 small) Do not drain the zucchini! The natural water in the zucchini will add to the moisture of the bread

- 1 cup chopped walnuts

- 3 cups flour

- 1 teaspoon baking powder

- 1 teaspoon baking soda

- 1 teaspoon salt

- 3 teaspoons cinnamon

- 3 teaspoons vanilla extract

- 1 cup white sugar

- 1 cup brown sugar

- 1 cup oil (to make the 'healthier' version, substitute 1/2 cup oil and 1/2 cup applesauce).

- 3 eggs (healthier substitution - 2 egg whites and 2 mashed bananas)

Directions:

- Preheat oven to 325 and line your muffin pans with cups or grease & flour your bread pan.

- Sift all your dry ingredients together in a large bowl - your flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon.

- Beat eggs, vanilla extract, and sugar in a separate bowl.

- Combine the wet and dry ingredients and mix well.

- Mix in your walnuts and grated zucchini, then pour batter into your prepared pans.

- Bake at 325 for 15 minutes if doing muffins or 55 minutes for bread. Definitely watch a few minutes before time, every few minutes I'd take out and test until the toothpick came out clean.

- Let cool, remove from pan, and enjoy!