Lemon Zucchini Skillet Bread
A quick bread baked in a Dutch oven over coals, with dried zucchini instead of a garden's worth of fresh squash.
- calories
- 250
- weight
- 2.6 oz
- cal / oz
- 96
- protein
- 5 g
- serves
- 12, scales
- prep
- 20 min
- cook
- 45 min
- total time
- 65 min
- water
- 300 ml cold
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Breakfast
- Snack
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Vegetarian
- Real dishes
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| White whole wheat flour | 2 cups | |
|---|---|---|
| Bread flour | 1 cup | |
| Baking powder | 1 tbsp | |
| Sugar | 3/4 cup | |
| Salt | 1 tsp | |
| Nutmeg | 1/4 tsp | |
| Dried lemon peel | 1 tbsp | stands in for fresh zest |
| Powdered whole milk | 1/4 cup | reconstitutes into the 3/4 cup of milk |
| Powdered eggs | 3 tbsp | equals 2 eggs |
| Dried shredded zucchini | 3/4 cup | dehydrated at home from 1 1/2 cups fresh |
| Raisins or dried cranberries | 1/2 cup | |
| Chopped walnuts or pecans | 1/2 cup | |
| Vegetable oil | 1/4 cup | |
| Bottled lemon juice | 1 tbsp | plus 1 tbsp for the glaze |
| Powdered sugar | 3/4 cup | glaze, optional |
| Butter or margarine | 1 tbsp | glaze, optional |
Method
- Cover the dried zucchini with about 100 ml of cold water and leave it 15 minutes. It should go soft and floppy, not soupy. Drain off anything that pools.
- Burn a fire down to coals, or light about 20 briquettes. You want steady low heat, not flame.
- Whisk the dry mix, milk powder, and egg powder together in the Dutch oven's lid or a bowl. Add 200 ml of cold water, the oil, and the lemon juice, and stir until there is no dry flour left.
- Fold in the zucchini, dried fruit, and nuts. Do not beat it. Overworked batter bakes tough.
- Oil the Dutch oven well, scrape the batter in, and level it.
- Bake 40 to 50 minutes with a ring of coals under the oven and roughly twice as many on the lid. Rotate the oven and the lid a quarter turn every 10 minutes so it does not scorch on one side.
- It is done when a twig or knife comes out clean from the middle. Let it sit 10 minutes before cutting or it tears.
- For the glaze, melt the butter into the lemon juice in a mug, stir in the powdered sugar, and pour it over once the bread has cooled.
This started as an oven loaf and a heap of fresh shredded zucchini, which is a poor thing to carry. Dehydrated zucchini rehydrates to nearly the same texture and weighs almost nothing, and it lets you control the water instead of hoping a wet squash gets it right. Powdered milk and powdered eggs replace the two things that would otherwise need a cooler.
A Dutch oven over coals runs hotter on the bottom than a home oven does, so most of the heat belongs on the lid. Rotating both oven and lid is the only real technique here. Skip it and you get one burnt edge and one raw one.
Packing
Combine the flours, baking powder, sugar, salt, nutmeg, lemon peel, milk powder, and egg powder in one bag at home. Zucchini, fruit, and nuts ride in a second bag. Oil goes in a small bottle. Glaze sugar in a third bag if you want it.
Variations
- Skip the glaze entirely and eat it with butter. It is a bread, not a cake.
- Swap all three cups for plain all-purpose flour if that is what you have.
- Leave out the nuts and add another 1/4 cup of dried fruit.
https://www.lodgecastiron.com/blogs/recipe/zucchini-lemon-bread