Almost To Good To Share

Let's call it Oreo Cake, or Cookies 'n Cream, because that is what it tastes like.  Who would have thought that a pound of zucchini could turn into something so glorious!

I wanted a picture of the whole thing, but there isn't much left!

By now, if you have been reading the blog regularly you are most likely aware that Owen has feeding difficulties.  We strive to get quality nutrition in on a daily basis.  Most of Owen's daily calories come from supplemental nutrition in the form of a complete liquid diet.  Anything else that I can get in to him needs to be nutritious, well balanced, and from my kitchen.  This week we spoiled the whole family with a chocolate zucchini cake!  Normally the zucchini would go into muffins or be pureed into a soup for him.

Maybe I'm being a little sentimental, what with school coming in just a little over a week.  Or maybe I'm feeling this way because I am just so proud of him for overcoming so many hurdles in the last year.  Last fall he was still barely speaking.  He had been very ill over the month of August, and his body weight dropped from 30lbs to 26lbs.  He was still in diapers, and I was at wits end trying to figure out how to toilet train him.  He could not dress himself.  He was unable to answer questions.  And I was terrified.

Today, he is up to almost 34lbs, quite the feat when you consider his diet is mainly liquid.  He dresses himself with hardly any help from me.  His language is growing daily.  He is toilet trained, both day and night - although he currently asks for a diaper for bowel movements.  I can live with that while we get his tummy issues under control with the help of the gastroenterologist.  I am so pleased with his progress and how much effort he has put in that I felt a celebration was in order.

So why not celebrate with vegetables, cleverly disguised as CAKE!

I don't see any vegetables in there, do you?

Zucchini Chocolate Cake

• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1 cup all purpose spelt flour
• 2 cups sugar 
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 4 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 4 eggs
• 3/4 cup high quality oil- I used olive oil
• 3/4 cup unsweetened applesauce*
• 1 lb zucchini*, grated

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease and flour a 9 x 13 inch cake pan.  In a medium bowl stir together flours, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, soda and salt.  Add the eggs, oil and applesauce.  Mix well.  Fold in zucchini, taking care to ensure that it is evenly distributed.  Pour into prepared pan.  Bake for 50 to 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in centre comes out clean.  Cool completely.  This recipe works for cupcakes as well- it will yield approximately 18 jumbo cupcakes.

Now this is a closely guarded secret.  The frosting....caution!  This is highly addictive, and a little messy!

• 1/4 cup of butter (or dairy free spread)
• 1 to 1/12 cups icing sugar
• 2 tbsp organic coconut milk (do NOT stir first- take the cream from the top of the can)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

In a large bowl, beat butter with icing sugar until there are no lumps.   The icing sugar will fly around a bit because it is so light, but this makes a perfect "buttercream" every time!  Once you have no lumps or bumps left, add the coconut milk cream and the vanilla.  Spread on cooled cake.  Voila!

The result?  A little slice of Heaven!  Enjoy!

*****UPDATED October 18th 2011******

The kids loved the coconut cream filled cupcake version!

I ran out of zucchini before I hit the 1lb mark!!!  What to do?  I know!  Carrots!  Surprisingly, the substitutions below did not change the flavour or the texture of the end product!  Hooray!  More variety of vegetables in every bite!  I should mention that I increased the total vegetable amount in this cake to 2lbs.  Even better!

• 1 lb grated zucchini*
• 1 lb grated carrots*
• 1 cup pureed butternut squash* in place of applesauce

For the cupcakes I piped in a small amount of the buttercream frosting (if it's inside the cupcake it travels well in lunch boxes), but these would be great filled with cream cheese!

Birthday Cupcakes!