Chances are that you have a lot of zucchini coming your way right now if you started a garden this year or if you're like me and your garden flopped in the midst of having a baby, then you have wonderful friends who give you fresh veggies from their gardens.  Either way, it's zucchini season here in New England and I'm here for it.  I love zucchini season.  Dinners, muffins, breads and more!

This recipe will take one bowl and about one hour from start to finish.  I used a high powered blender to puree the zucchini but you could also shred it if you don't feel like pulling out the blender or food processor. Let's get to it!

Ingredients
-3/4 cup zucchini puree or shredded zucchini
-1/2 cup olive oil
-1 tsp vanilla extract
-2 eggs
-3/4 cup sugar
- 1 1/2 cups flour
-1/2 cup unsweetened baking cocoa
-1 tsp espresso powder
-1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tsp baking powder
-1/2 cup chocolate chips

Directions
Puree or shred your zucchini.  Prepare a loaf pan with non-stick cooking spray and pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, mix together the zucchini, oil, vanilla, eggs and sugar.  Then add the flour, cocoa, espresso powder, salt and baking powder.  Use a fork to lightly mix together the dry ingredients and then thoroughly stir together the wet and dry ingredients. Pour the batter into the loaf pan and sprinkle chocolate chips on top.  Bake for 45-50 minutes.  Test the bread by inserting a toothpick or knife and it should come out mostly clean.  Allow to cool in the pan for 20-30 minutes and then remove the loaf to a baking rack to finish cooling, slice and enjoy.

One of the things that I've enjoyed about this quarantine period is that I've been forced to get creative with pantry meals, snacks and desserts.  My usual recipe development has more come from a place of "this is what I want to make and this is what I need so let's go to the store and get those things."  The current situation is very different.  We are only making grocery trips when we need to and my husband has been doing all of the grocery shopping so that I stay out of the stores while expecting (although this week I found a local market that is doing curb side pick up and I'm going to go for a drive later today- times are definitely different when getting out into the car feels like an outing). 

This brownie recipe was developed with all things in my pantry and I have been using up a bottle of Tahini more lately when I noticed that it's pretty creamy....and I had a small amount of chocolate chips left and I wondered if I could melt the two together for a brownie ganache.  It turns out that I can and that it's really good.  The brownies are pretty sweet with both white and brown sugar and the tahini ganache sort of balances it out with a nutty flavor.  I wondered if my kids would back away from it once they tried them but nope.  They each stole an extra brownie when I wasn't looking.

Here's what you'll need:

Ingredients

For the brownie (makes approximately 1 dozen)
-1/2 cup butter at room temperature
-1/2 cup brown sugar
-1/2 cup white sugar
-2 eggs
-1 tsp vanilla extract
-3/4 cup flour
-1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa
-1 tsp espressor powder
-1/2 tsp salt
-1 tsp baking powder

For the Ganache
-1/2 cup tahini
-1/2 cup chocolate chips

Directions
Pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees and line an 8 x 8 baking pan with parchment paper. In a large bowl, use a stand or hand mixer to cream together the butter and sugars until light and fluffy (about 1-2 minutes).  Add in the eggs one at a time and mix together.  Add in the vanilla and mix together.  Add all of the dry ingredients on top of the wet ingredients and mix them together with a fork before turning back on the mixer to incorporate them with the wet ingredients.  The batter will be thick...almost frosting like.

Pour the brownie batter into the prepared pan and use the back of a spoon or rubber spatula to spread and smooth the batter evenly throughout the pan.  Bake at 375 for 20 minutes.  This baking time leaves them fudgy and a small amount of batter coming out on a toothpick when inserted.  Allow to cool completely in the pan.

Once cooled, prepare the ganache by adding the tahini to a small pot on medium heat.  Allow to warm up and then add in the chocolate chips.  Stir continuously until the chocolate melts into the tahini and completely blends together.  Pour over the brownies and spread evenly with a spoon or spatula.  Place the ganache topped brownies in the fridge to chill and set for about an hour.

Lift the parchment paper up and out of the pan, slice into 12 squares and enjoy!

I was really late to the peanut butter game because it just wasn't a thing in Ireland, which is where I was born and lived for a short time until my family emigrated to Canada and then later to the U.S.  I could be mistaken but chocolate and peanut butter still don't seem to be a thing on the Emerald Isle and I'm pretty good at scoping out chocolate on each my trips (my last one was late 2017).  I don't remember exactly when the good old Reese's Peanut Butter cup first graced my lips but I do know that I'm thankful for it because wow.  Those things are dangerous.

It turns out that peanut butter packs some great health benefits, as long as you look for a brand that has minimal ingredients and no hidden preservatives or filler oils.  I actually have been a Vitamix owner for years and loooove that blender, but I only made peanut butter from dry roasted peanuts for the first time very recently.  I had this idea in my head that it was going to be a madly messy process so I just didn't do it.  I was wrong- it wasn't! It took me all of 3 minutes to go from a jar of dry roasted peanuts to a jar of creamy peanut butter and clean up was a snap!

With Valentine's Day around the corner, these dark chocolate bites filled with coconut and peanut butter would make a nice homemade treat.  They're rich, decadent and clean eating with no refined sugar or filler ingredients.

Here's what you'll need:

Ingredients
​(makes approximately 15-20 chocolates)
-3/4 cup unsweetened coconut (flaked or shredded)
-12 pitted dates
-1/3 cup unsweetened baking cocoa
-1/2 cup peanut butter
-2 TBS maple syrup
-1 x 10 oz package of dark chocolate chips (use a vegan dark chocolate if you want the entire recipe to be plant based)

Directions
Place the dates, peanut butter, baking cocoa and coconut into the bowl of a food processor and pulse/process until it begins to come into a crumbly mixture.  Then slowly drizzle in the maple syrup while you run the food processor on low until the mixture begins to come together and clean from the sides of the bowl.  

Line a cookie tray with parchment paper.  Using your hands, roll the mixture into balls approximately 1 TBS in size.  Once all of the mixture is rolled, place the tray in the freezer to set for approximately 30 minutes (it's fine if you leave them in longer- you can break up the steps here).  Start to melt the dark chocolate in a double boiler about 5 minutes before you plan to take the prepared mixture from the freezer.  Roll each ball into the melted chocolate and return to the parchment paper lined cookie tray.  Drizzle the extra melted chocolate across the tops and then return the tray to the freezer to set for 30-60 minutes.  Store the finished chocolates in the fridge in an air tight container.

Enjoy!