Pineapple Zucchini Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

Kristin and I are up in Vermont again this year, and it seems that we're developing a trend for baking with zucchini while we're here.  Last year, we made Chocolate Chip Zucchini Muffins.  They were fantastic.  So tasty, in fact, that Kristin agreed to marry me.  We can't exactly repeat the proposal, but this year my birthday was one of our first days in the cabin, so we decided to make some zucchini cake.

I started off searching for a recipe for chocolate zucchini sheet cake, but found a recipe for a pineapple zucchini cake, instead, and decided to shake things up.  We made a number of changes to that recipe, but the end result was killer - a super-moist, flavorful cake with sweet and tangy icing that everybody loved both on the night of my birthday and over coffee as breakfast the next day.

Here's what you'll need for the cake portion (the icing will come later): flour, sugar, vegetable oil, zucchini, crushed pineapple, sweetened coconut, eggs, baking soda, vanilla, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and salt.

Start by combining the flour, sugar, coconut, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg in a large mixing bowl. Give them a good stir.

In another, somewhat smaller mixing bowl, beat the eggs, then add the oil and vanilla and mix well.

Stir the wet stuff into the dry stuff, then add the grated zucchini and the all but a couple of tablespoons of juice from the can of crushed pineapple.  The batter will be wet and thick.

Pour the cake batter into a well-greased 9x13" pan and bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes.  It's done when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean and the edges have just started to pull awy from the edges of the pan.

Let it cool completely before you frost the cake - this will take a surprisingly long time.  The cake is quite dense, so it will hold its heat for ages.  It wouldn't hurt to refrigerate it - we actually liked it cold quite a lot.

While the cake is baking - or even while it's cooling - you'll need to make the frosting.  We forgot to take an ingredients picture (oops!), but here what you'll need: softened butter, a package of cream cheese, powdered sugar, vanilla, the couple of tablespoons of pineapple juice you saved from the can, and maybe just a splash of orange juice, too.

First, combine the softened butter and cream cheese in a large mixing bowl and beat until smooth.  This would be much easier with a mixer - we don't have one up here, but a large fork and some elbow grease did the job, too.

Finish the frosting by adding the powdered sugar, vanilla, pineapple juice, and orange juice (if you want some).  Mix again until it's smooth and at the texture you like - a bit more sugar makes a firmer frosting, a bit less leaves it relatively thin.  We kept it a bit on the thinner side to make for easy spreading.

When the cake is finally cool, spread the icing over the top.  We refrigerated the iced cake afterward to help everything set up a bit, and it ended up very tasty that way, especially on a hot summer day.

Serve generous slices of cake, and give some real consideration to some coffee on the side - the earthiness of the zucchini really matches well with a good, dark-roast coffee.  

This cake made for a very happy birthday, and we just might have to make it again before another year is up.

Recipe: Pineapple Zucchini Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
Prep Time: 10 Minutes | Cook Time: 40 Minutes | Difficulty: Easy | Servings: 12 Large or 16 Medium Slices

Ingredients

Cake:

• 2 1/3 cups All-Purpose Flour
• 1 1/3 cups White Sugar
• 1/2 cup Sweetened Coconut
• 2 large Eggs, beaten
• 2 cups Grated Zucchini
• 1 (20 oz) can Crushed Pineapple, undrained
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 2 tsp Baking Soda
• 1 tsp Salt
• 3 tsp Ground Cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp Ground Nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp Ground Ginger
• 1 tsp Vanilla

Frosting:

• 2 cups Powdered Sugar
• 1 (8 oz) package Cream Cheese
• 2 tbsp Butter
• 2 tsp Vanilla
• 2 tbsp reserved Pineapple Juice
• (Optional): 1-2 tbsp Orange Juice

Instructions

Cake:

1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, coconut, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger.
3. In a medium bowl, beat eggs, then add oil and vanilla.  Stir to combine.
4. Add wet ingredients into dry ingredients, followed by grated zucchini and crushed pineapple.  Reserve approximately 2 tbsp pineapple juice in the can for the frosting.  Mix well to combine.  Batter will be thick and wet.
5. Pour batter into a greased 9x13" pan.  Bake 35-40 minutes at 350 degrees until a toothpick comes out clean and the edges have just started to pull away from the pan.
6. Cool completely before frosting.

Frosting:

1. In a large bowl, combine butter and cream cheese.  Mix well until smooth.
2. Add powdered sugar, vanilla, pineapple juice, and orange juice if desired.  Mix again until smooth.  
3. Add additional powdered sugar as necessary to achieve desired texture, mixing well.
4. Spread frosting over cake once cooled completely.  Refrigerate frosted cake to set up frosting.  Serve cold.

Dave and Gill's Wedding!

I didn't get to do much cooking this week.   I was off in Virginia, just outside of Washington, D.C., where I was lucky enough to stand up in the wedding of two great friends from Denison.  Dave and Gillian tied the knot in a great ceremony, outside in perfect weather, and the week featured some really fantastic food.  I may not have made it myself, and I'm deeply sorry not to have the recipes for some of it, but it was delicious none the less.

Ohhh the rehearsal dinner.  I had the salad, the steak, and the profiteroles, and each were a slam dunk.  The salad was a classic Caesar with great, punchy flavor from the Parmesan and pepper.  

The steak was just stunning.  It was a long, thin cut, grilled quickly to medium and topped with an amazing, herbal compound butter.  Try though I might, I couldn't figure out what all herbs went into the butter - it amazingly complex, and I so wish I had a recipe.  Many undignified sounds were made around the table as we all had our first bites, and the plates were soon very, very clean.

A lot of folks came into the dinner asking "What's a Profiterole?" and left with a new favorite dessert.  Soft, lush ice-cream in nutty, flaky pastry topped with rich chocolate - what's not to like?  All in all, it was a fantastic, fantastic meal.

The dinner at the reception was no slouch, either.  As so often happens on the wedding day, we had little time to eat while preparing, so the groomsmen had subsisted largely on goldfish crackers and oreos up until dinner time.  The starting salad was tasty - totally different from the Caesar of the night before.  It was a great mix of greens with candied nuts, a delicate dressing, and a potent, cheesy crouton.  It didn't last long.

Once again, I went for steak for the main course, though this steak and the rehearsal steak were very different.  The steak at the reception was a whole lot of meat - a manly, thick cut over mashed potatoes and plenty of vegetables.  The peppercorn brandy jus was killer - again, something I'll attempt to recreate in the near future.

And then there was cake.  Dave looks to have gotten a little stabby with the server here as he and Gill made the first cut.

Gill got revenge on behalf of the cake.

There were a couple of cakes hidden in there - both a red velvet and a chocolate/raspberry.  I had a piece of the chocolate/raspberry, and it was everything one could hope for in a wedding cake.  Rich chocolate, tangy raspberry, and just the right amount of frosting.  I meant to go back for some red velvet later on, but was too busy dancing, drinking, and chatting to ever do so.

All in all, it was a great few days away with good friends and fantastic food.  I couldn't be happier for Dave and Gill, and now I'm all the more excited for my own wedding with Kristin next summer.  

I'll be back with a new recipe next week!