Gluten Free Zucchini Tomato Coconut Butter Bread – Recipe

When my brain is fried, I put my hands to work.

I’ve been like this since I was a kid. As an only child growing up in a house where my parents forbade cable TV, I got into cooking – baking, actually – really early.

When I was bored I’d open up the dessert section of Joy of Cooking, and use whatever we had in the house to make things like Boston Cream Pie and German Chocolate Cake. If we didn’t have something I needed I would enlist my nanny to to take me to the grocery store, and when the bowl was too heavy I’d make my mom hold it while I spatula’ed out the batter. I was basically unstoppable.

These days my baking hours are fewer and further between. I am rarely, if ever, bored.

But on a Saturday upstate when my brain was too fried to look at the computer and my body too tired to run around outside, it was good to flex my baking muscle.

Turns out it’s still in my bones after all these years!

Ingredients:

• 1 and 1/2 full cups of grated organic zucchini
• 1/3 cup of golden cherry tomatoes
• 1/2 cup of brown rice flour
• 1/2 cup of buckwheat flour
• 1/2 cup of gluten free corn meal
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon xanthan gum
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1 cup light brown sugar
• 1/3 cup of coconut butter
• 2 extra large eggs
• 1/4 cup full-fat coconut milk
• 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. Grease your baking pan with butter or coconut oil.
2. Place the shredded zucchini into some paper towels and gently squeeze out any moisture and set aside.
3. Put the brown rice flour, buckwheat flour, gluten-free cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, xanthan gum, salt and cinnamon in a medium bowl and blend with a whisk or a fork.
4. In a large bowl add the brown sugar, coconut butter, eggs, coconut milk, lemon juice, and vanilla. Whisk thoroughly until smooth. (To make this vegan, replace eggs with 1/3 cup of apple sauce.
5. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and beat until combined. Fold in the grated zucchini gently.
6. Spread half of the batter evenly into the pan, place half of the cherry tomatoes into the batter layer.
7. Spread the second half of the batter into the pan on top of the tomatoes, and stick the rest of the tomatoes into the batter.
8. Bake for 35-40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a loaf comes out clean.
9. Cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then gently turn out to cool completely on a rack.

Slice serve and enjoy!