To my astonishment, George managed to plant and cultivate a small vegetable and herb garden this year. Since we moved into our home seven years ago, he’s always maintained a garden, but I expected the addition of four babies to cramp is style. He scaled back quite a bit and stuck to two crops we thought we’d most enjoy: tomatoes and zucchini.
A few days ago, we got a chuckle out of his latest harvest. After a few minutes piddling in the garden, George strutted into the house hauling a 5.5 pound zucchini. To put it in perspective, this monster weighed more than any of our babies at birth. Now that is one enormous zucchini! George presumed this thing would be too woody for consumption due to it’s extended time on the vine. One thing I detest is waste. I wasn’t going to let a perfectly good zucchini go unused if I could help it. The next day I sliced it and found it to be tender and mild even raw. This particular one ended up being steamed then mashed into a gallon of baby food. The babies have enjoyed several zucchini medleys including: zucchini + apple + cinnamon, zucchini + apple + banana, and zucchini + tomatoes. I may have used up the big mama jamma for the babies, but we also had quite a few smaller zucchini to contend with.
Harper was as entertained by this gardening snafu as much as we were.
Rylin is a clever girl and knew this was meant to be eaten. She went after it like corn on the cob.
Do you see the little teeth marks?
As a wedding gift, a family friend gave us an assortment of kitchen utensils along with cherished recipes. We received this zucchini bread recipe. The original version calls for 1 c. pecans, but I’m not a fan of nuts in bread so I omit them.
While baking, this bread fills your home with a delicious aroma. It gets a nice crust on top and is great with coffee. Note: greasing AND flouring the pan is critical. We used Pam cooking spray and it got stuck.
I also sauteed onion and garlic with diced zucchini and tomatoes to toss over pasta for dinner. This week I’m planning to try my hand at oven baked zucchini fries with roasted chicken. After that, I’m out of brilliant uses for zucchini. If you have a fabulous zucchini recipe, I’d love to give yours a whirl.
hugs!
Amber
Four to Adore 
You are making me hungry for zucchini!
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Lol! We’ve got it by the bushel over here.
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Lol! We’ve got it by the bushel over here.
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We love zucchini boats in our house! We use a recipe similar to this one: http://southernfood.about.com/od/zucchinirecipes/r/bl30205c.htm
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George mentioned stuffing them last night. Thank you for the recipe! I pinned it to try tonight.
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Thats HUGE!! Im going to have to try the bread one day!
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It’s ridiculous! This bread is seriously yummy, hope you love it as much as I.
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That is one big zucchini and Rylin knew exactly what to do with it. Thanks for that tip about how not to get it stuck. 🙂
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She sure did! You’re welcome, I like others to learn from my mistakes.
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Yum! I’m ready for neighbors to start bringing over their extras…and there are always extras!
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Oh yes! In fact our neighbors should be getting some soon.
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A) I can not get over the cuteness of those photos and B) now I really want zucchini bread. I just had a baby anyone wanna do the baking for me?
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So happy you like! This bread is delicious! If we can manage with quads in tow, I bet new mama can too 😉
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oh I have no idea how you do it I am frazzled this week with new baby arriving and mine are all 3 years apart. Yours makes for interesting reads though.
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It is interesting here no doubt! We do it just like you, one day at a time. I should admit, it took us several days of talking about baking before we found time to do it. We have parenting challenges, but you do too. It’s just different challenges.
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love the admission that it took days to get to 🙂
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Makes me wish I’d planted zucchini this year! But I do have baby butternuts and I’m so excited!
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Oooh, baby butter nuts sound fab!
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Awesome! we grow zucchini and tomatoes too, but I got the crop in a little later this year, and haven’t picked any yet. I’m going to put my recipe for zucchini bread on sometime as well (I used some of my frozen zucchini from last year to make it), but I’ll have to try yours as well. I always put parchment paper under my zucchini bread–but not with any other bread I make.
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I forget about parchment paper, that is a great idea. I may also freeze excess zucchini like you if we run out of new cooking ideas.
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Oh my gosh! I didnt know they got that big-wow! Cute photos too. : )
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LOL, I didn’t know they could get so big either! Glad you like the photos. I know you are into using good pictures on blogs so that’s a true compliment.
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I want to know more about the baby food recipes. My little one hasn’t started foods yet, but I’d like to try my hand at making food. You mentioned zucchini, apple, cinnamon?
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Homemade baby food is really easy to do! Plus it’s also less expensive and often times more nutritious. Back when we started spoon feeds, I wrote this: https://fourtoadore.com/?s=baby+food I have a few of my “recipes” at the bottom. Zucchini is really mild so it pairs well with other fruits. The babies enjoy it with banana and/ or apple and a dash of cinnamon. Just make sure you introduce your LO one food at a time and make sure there are no allergies before mixing more ingredients together. Happy cooking!
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