Some Greens I Can Sink My Teeth Into

Yea! Sunday Sweets is back! I love desserts, but it can be hard to find one that isn't loaded with fat or sugar. I found a recipe for Zucchini Brownies and made a few changes. I know what you're thinking, I've already made a dessert with zucchini, but I like sneaking some greens into sweets.

I started off with what looks like a lot of stuff, but I promise it came together really quick!

I originally had planned on doing a 3 sugar blend: real sugar (because sometimes baked goods with Splenda only don't come out well), Splenda (less calories) and Splenda Brown Sugar Blend (it's the best of both worlds right?). But I got lazy and ended up just doing 2/3 real sugar and 1/3 Splenda.

I used half the oil of the original recipe and half applesauce. I know a lot of recipes omit oil and just use applesauce, but I've found that that tends to make the baked good more cake-y and less chewy.

When I mixed everything it, it seemed pretty dry . . .

I ended up having to pat it down and finally was ready to toss it into the oven.

I took them out of the oven and they looked a tad dry. But they were soooo easy to cut! You know how normally when you cut brownies (especially if you don't wait for them too cool completely, which never happens at my house), they all crumble and end up looking mangled and half eaten? No problem here!

I sprinkled them with confectioners sugar instead of frosting. I think if I ever make them again, I'll get some reduced sugar frosting because my end product was a little dry and a little bland (Cody agreed!).

Do you have any recipes for sweets that have hidden veggies in them?? What do you wish you could hide in a brownie?

Here are the stats for the final product:

Nutritional Information

Servings Per Recipe: 24

Amount Per Serving

Calories: 91

Fat: 0.3 g

Sodium: 177 mg

Fiber: 1.6 g

And the recipe!

Zucchini Brownies

1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup applesauce
3/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup Splenda
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups shredded zucchini
2 tbsp confectioners sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9x13 inch baking pan.

In a large bowl, mix together the oil, sugar, Splenda and 2 teaspoons vanilla until well blended. Combine the flour, 1/2 cup cocoa, baking soda and salt; stir into the sugar mixture. Fold in the zucchini. Spread evenly into the prepared pan.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes in the preheated oven, until brownies spring back when gently touched.

Dust lightly with powdered sugar.

Zucchini Cupcakes, Take II

Happy Thursday! We're that much closer to the weekend! Usually on Thursdays I start making up my grocery list so I can go first thing on Saturday and get it out of the way. Just in case my bloggy friends out there in the blogosphere are doing the same, I wanted to share a cupcake recipe you may want to try!

Remember our Coconut Day Celebration? Kat had picked up some coconut butter to help celebrate and she had mentioned that I was bringing some zucchini cupcakes. Well, I did and they were . . . okay. One of the girls we worked with said they didn't taste like cupcakes, they tasted like a sweet vegetable bread. That's not a bad thing, but I wanted this recipe to be one of those recipes that people love and then shock people when I tell them there's a vegetable in it!

Anyway, I got the recipe from Cook Yourself Thin: Skinny Meals That You Can Make in Minutes, check it out below. I got this book last summer on a whim and actually liked a lot of what I made. The only thing I didn't really like was they list the calories, but nothing else (no fat, sodium, carbs, etc.) Last week I followed the recipe to a T last time. So today I tried a few adjustments to make them totally cravable.

Cook Yourself Thin: Skinny Meals You Can Make in Minutes

I omitted the ground nuts and subbed out flour in hopes of lightening it up and tried Splenda Brown Sugar Blend instead of 100% regular sugar. I also didn't use the recipe for the frosting in the book, I used a reduced sugar vanilla frosting.

I combined the dry ingredients and then the wet ingredients. Then I shredded the peeled zucchini and added it to the wet mixture. You can't really tell, but the grated zucchini is a pretty light green color and super watery.

Then I added the wet zucchini mixture to the dry mixture and mixed them all up.

Then I filled my little cupcake holders and let them do their thang in the oven for 28 minutes.

I let them cool (barely) and covered them with some frosting.

Final verdict: Much better! Still pretty dense, but this frosting was 10x better than coconut butter (and loads less in saturated fat!!). Looking back, I really think my cupcakes are so dense because I don't have an electric mixer and mix everything by hand with a whisk. And honestly, my forearm gets tired in, like, 30 seconds, so there's probably not enough air incorporated into them.

Any other suggestions to help lighten up these little guys??

Here's the nutritional info for 2 cupcake, topped with 1 tbsp reduced sugar frosting:

Nutritional Information

Servings Per Recipe: 12

Amount Per Serving

Calories: 153

Fat: 5 g

Sodium: 151 mg

Fiber: 1.3 g

And here's my recipe, adapted from Cook Yourself Thin:

Zucchini Cupcakes

1 1/4 c all-purpose flour
1/2 c oat flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 large eggs
3 tbsp Splenda Brown Sugar Blend
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/4 c zucchini, finely grated

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Combine the flour, oat flour, baking powder and salt. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs, brown sugar blend and vanilla until thick and lightly colored, about 4 minutes. Add the zucchini until incorporated.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and continue to beat until well mixed.

Pour ~1/3 c batter into 12 lined muffin tins and bake for 25-28 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Top with your favorite frosting (I like the reduced sugar vanilla with these cupcakes!)