Squash and Chocolate

Anyone who has ever had a garden and grown zucchini or summer squash knows that no matter how many plans you have for eating it straight from the garden, you will always have WAY TOO MANY. I gleefully planted about six squash plants this summer, hoping for zukes and yellow summer squash galore. Well, I got 'em. What I momentarily forgot is that I really don't love zucchini bread (at all), and you can only eat squash in so many ways before you start fantasizing about playing baseball with a homegrown bat in hand.

Early this summer I read the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver. Easily my favorite non-fiction read this year. Hands down. In between the pages of her narrative describing how her family spent an entire year eating only local and homegrown goods (no processed foods, non-organic, or non-local sources), she also writes extensively about the food industry today, and basically how much we have been duped. Education brings enlightenment. We have spent the summer very happily not consuming any processed foods within our home. We are changing the way we eat and view meat and dairy, non-seasonal produce, imported goods, and of course, we cook and bake almost everything from scratch. 

This doesn't mean we can't eat cake. It simply changes what we use to make the cake. And how we think about vegetables. For instance, I want something sweet, but have a counter full of squash. Why not make the sweet with the squash? Light bulb!

I am not very good at making up recipes when it comes to baking (cooking is altogether easier, in my opinion), so thankfully the collaborating authors of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle already have what they refer to as a sweet "disappearing squash" recipe. I tried it, used one of my yellow summer squashes instead of a zuke and put it in a pan to make bars instead of cookies. It baked perfectly and is a huge hit!

Moist, savory, and much better for you than Betty Crocker's version (although eating a carrot is still much better for the body, obviously, but Lord knows sometimes we just need our chocolate!), I present to you the kids and husband approved squash chocolate chip cookie bars recipe, which you can also find here at the Animal, Vegetable, Miracle website, along with other seasonal recipes.

Zucchini Chocolate Chip Cookies

(Makes about two dozen)

1 EGG, BEATEN

½ CUP BUTTER

softened

½ CUP BROWN SUGAR

1/3 CUP HONEY

1 TBSP. VANILLA EXTRACT

Combine in large bowl.

1 CUP WHITE FLOUR

1 CUP WHOLE WHEAT FLOUR

½ TSP BAKING SODA

¼ TSP SALT

¼ TSP CINNAMON

¼ TSP NUTMEG

Combine in a separate, small bowl and blend into liquid mixture

1 CUP FINELY SHREDDED ZUCCHINI

12 OZ CHOCOLATE CHIPS

Stir these into other ingredients, mix well. Drop by spoonful onto greased baking sheet, and flatten with the back of a spoon. Bake at 350°, 10 to 15 minutes.

Fresh garden salad

It is perfectly lovely to live smack dab in the city and still be able to go outside and pick our dinner ten minutes before we eat it. That's what I call fresh, not to mention organic as well. 

 A few of our squash were finally ready, as well as some green bush beans. I didn't plant enough beans this year to satisfy our pallets (Lexi LOVES them raw - something I didn't anticipate back in February when planning the garden), but this growing season has been a learning curve enough as it is!

 These are Thumbelina carrots. I'm sure you can guess why. They are super cute, and I ordered the seeds with Lexi's excited voice in mind ("LOOK MAMA, BABY CARROTS!!!!"). The voice IS cute, as imagined, but somehow pulling these out from the earth with their enormous leafy tops leaves you wishing for a little more bang for your buck. In other words, more carrot. On the upside, they taste delicious. All two bites of it. :-)

 We are eating everything from our garden raw right now. Eric isn't ever thrilled about cooked or steamed veg anyway, so everything gets chopped up and thrown into the dinner salad. Here we have the carrots, beans, squash, and zucchini tossed with our Bright lights Swiss chard and Red Russian kale. Sprinkle on a little balsamic vinegar mixed with honey, add a side of fresh bread smeared with goat cheese and voila! Supper. Fresh, fast, and super delish.