Among all the February celebrations, my warmest is my hubby’s birthday. For the past couple of years, my daughter and I started a habit out of baking a cake on that day. I don’t often bake, so this makes this day extra special as it gives us the opportunity to share memorable, exciting, messy, one-off funny/panicky moments in the kitchen before we polish everything up before daddy comes home for the big surprise (well perhaps not-so-surprise anymore as he’s starting to notice the tradition now).

This year my daughter and I decided to bake a… Zucchini Cake! Credit for this idea has to go to my daughter’s amazing former nanny who introduced us to this cake.

I know some of you may be cringing and despite the nutritionist in me, I myself was initially skeptical, but the result is AMAZING and it’s almost impossible for someone to figure out that Zucchinis were involved in the mix! In effect, none of the people I served this cake to suspected this twist. So here you’re thinking, why should I ever try a Zucchini cake and to that I’d say:

• Zucchini replaces the butter and gives the necessary moist to the cake (ideal for people trying to cut on fat-calories since Zucchinis have close to zero fat!)

• Introducing vegetables in cake-baking with your kids is a great way to promote vegetables to them as appealing and fun

• It is actually VERY TASTY IN ITS OWN UNIQUE WAY and you will only believe me once you try it so here’s the recipe:

Ingredients (10-12 servings cake):

• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 2 cups sugar
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 2 tbsp. canola or other mild vegetable oil
• 4 large eggs
• 2 cups blended zucchini (about 1 large)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350° F (175°C). Grease a 10-cup Bundt pan.
2. In a bowl, stir together flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
3. Mix eggs and oil and add to the dry mix. Add blended zucchini and stir.
4. Pour the evenly mix into the prepared pan. Bake 60 minutes in the preheated oven.
5. Cool the cake completely before decorating it with your favorite garniture. Here I sprinkled on my beautiful blossom-shaped Bundt a bit of confectioners’ sugar then left the final touch to my daughter who decorated it with her favorite fresh berries!