Waste Reduction and Chocolate Muffins

I am very excited to be taking on the the Food Waste Reduction Challenge hosted by Crunchy Chicken (see sidebar for link). To start out I tossed any old food that I found in the fridge so that we can start fresh. Most of what I tossed were old dressings and sauces that we never use and brought here with us from the old house. I also threw out some shrimp and cocktail sauce from Christmas and one thing of leftovers from a restaurant. I plan to use my postal scale to weigh anything we throw out in February.

When I got to the freezer I was relieved not to find much that needed to be tossed. I did pitch some leftover cheesy potatoes we had frozen from our wedding. Then I came across the several bags of frozen shredded zucchini from last years garden. I had yet to use any of them. So, what's a non-wasting girl to do with all that zucchini?

Make muffins! Yeah, chocolate muffins to be exact. I pulled together a recipe from a few different ones to come up with the following:

Chocolate Muffins with (Shhh!) Zucchini
2 2/3 cups whole grain pastry flour (or whole wheat flour)
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
1 1/2 tsp. salt
3 eggs
1 cup shredded zucchini (could also use applesauce!)
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream (or milk)
1/2 cup oil
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 cup chopped almonds and/or 1/2 cup Andes baking chips

I mixed the wet ingredients together first then added the dry. This was enough to make 24 muffins. I filled 12 muffin cups then mixed about 1/2 cup Andes mint baking chips in to the remainder. After filling the other 12 cups I sprinkled some tops with more chips and others with the almonds. I left some plain as well.

Bake at 325 degrees F for 20-25 minutes. These are delicious!! Let me know if you try them. I froze 8, took 8 to work, and left 8 for us to eat.