Zucchini Bread

Nathan and I went to the local farmer's market this weekend and picked up tons of fresh fruits and veggies. The zucchini looked amazing, so of course, I found the largest one I could find so I could stuff it for dinner this week. (Mom, I need your recipe that you used to make!) I decided to take the zucchini and stuff it with whatever we had in fridge. This turned out to be some diced peppers, black beans, and ground beef. I topped it with some hot pepper cheese and baked it. It was a great, quick meal. Afterwards though, I ended up with alot of the 'insides' of the zucchini that looked great, but I just wasn't too sure what to do with all of it. Soooo... I decided to make zucchini bread!  I had some dark chocolate chips laying around too, so I threw them in too. :) The result has been me having to spend all night hiding it from Nathan so I can have a few pieces left over for the rest of the week. It's a pretty dense bread, so this would be great for a quick breakfast. I am going to try and make this bread again, but attempt to try it with carrots and raisins so it's more of a 'carrot cake' zucchini bread. I'll test it out and post results later!

1/2 c unsalted butter (melted)
1/2 c natural sugar cane (turbinado sugar)
1/4 c brown sugar Splenda
3 large eggs
1 tbsp vanilla extract
3-4 cups zucchini (I used the leftovers and just diced them up and squeezed them out in papertowels, but most recipes call for the zucchini to be grated with skin on, whatever you prefer)
1 c whole wheat graham flour
2 c whole wheat flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tbsp pumpkin pie spice
1/2 c dark chocolate chips

Optional: Add 1/2 c chopped walnuts on top of the bread before you bake it.

• Line a loaf pan (5x9" loaf pan) with parchment paper so that it's easy to pull the bread right out.
• Preheat the oven to 350.
• In a mixer, put butter and sugars together and beat thoroughly until fluffy. Add eggs in slowly and continue to run the mixer on low, then proceed to add the vanilla and then the zucchini.
• In a seperate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and pumpkin pie spice.
• Combine the wet ingredients with the dry ingredients.
• Fold in the dark chocolate chips.
• Pour into the pans, line with parchment paper, and top with walnuts (optional).
• Bake loaf for about 45-55 minutes. Remove the hot loaf from the pan and let cool on wire rack.