Forest Girl Farm

Two cups of grated zucchini can be hiding half a cup of water, and if you dump all of it into your batter, no amount of extra baking time will save the middle of that loaf. Gummy zucchini bread is almost never an oven problem. It’s a moisture problem, and it’s fixable in about five minutes.

Why Is My Zucchini Bread Gummy in the Middle?

Zucchini is roughly 94 percent water. When you grate it, all those cells rupture and the water goes straight into your flour, which means the batter is wetter than the recipe ever intended. The outside sets, the center stays wet, and you get that dense, sticky band right through the middle.

Here’s the fix:

1. Grate the zucchini on the large holes of a box grater, skin and all
2. Toss it with a pinch of salt and let it sit in a colander for 10 minutes
3. Squeeze it hard in a clean dish towel over the sink or a measuring cup
4. Fluff it up with your fingers before it goes into the batter so it doesn’t bake in as a wet clump

A word of warning: don’t wring it bone dry. You want it damp, not sopping. If you squeeze out much more than half a cup from two cups of zucchini, you’ve gone too far and the loaf will come out dry instead.

Which Zucchini Should You Use?

This time of year in zone 9, the plants are past being polite about it, and there’s usually one you missed under a leaf that’s now the size of a forearm.

• Small to medium (6 to 8 inches): best flavor, tender skin, minimal seeds. Just grate and go
• The giant one you missed: perfectly usable for bread. Halve it, scoop out the spongy seed core with a spoon, then grate the firm flesh
• Yellow summer squash or crookneck: works exactly the same, and it disappears into the loaf
• Pattypan: grates fine but holds even more water, so squeeze it twice

A Few Things That Make It Better

Once the water problem is solved, a handful of small adjustments turn an average loaf into one people ask about:

• Bake at 350°F for 55 to 60 minutes in a 9×5 pan, and start checking at 50 minutes with a skewer in the very center
• Let it cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then all the way on a rack. Slicing hot zucchini bread makes it gummy all over again
• Brown butter instead of oil, if you’ve got the extra pan to wash
• Grated zucchini freezes beautifully. Squeeze it, measure it into 2-cup portions, and bag it flat for winter baking

Squeeze the zucchini. That’s the whole secret. What’s your favorite thing to do with the August squash pile?