Chocolate zucchini cake

We bake a chocolate cake for tea: add young zucchini to the dough - we use their ability to accept and emphasize the sweet taste, and give the dough looseness and moisture. We make the cream very chocolatey.

Ingredients

• For test:
• Young zucchini (or zucchini) - 500 g
• Walnuts (or almonds) - 120 g
• Dried cherries (or cranberries) - 100 g
• Sour cream 15% - 50 g
• Eggs - 3 pcs.
• Vegetable oil - 140 g
• Lemon juice (or orange) - 20 ml
• Sugar - 160 g
• Flour - 220 g (1.5 cups with a capacity of 250 ml)
• Cocoa powder - 25 g
• Baking powder - 6 g
• Soda - 4 g
• Ground cinnamon - 4 g
• Ground ginger - 4 g
• Ground nutmeg (optional) - 2 g
• Lemon or orange (zest) - 1 pc.
• Salt - 2 g
• Butter - for greasing the mold
• For cream:
• Cream cheese - 250 g
• Chocolate black - 150 g
• Cream 35% - 120 g
• Lemon juice (or orange) - 20 ml
• Powdered sugar - 120 g
• For decoration (optional):
• Almond flakes (or shredded coconut) - to taste

Directions

1. Prepare ingredients for the recipe.
2. Eggs should be at room temperature.
3. I used white sugar for this recipe, but brown will also work.
4. Any dried berries can be used: cranberries, dates, candied fruits. I have dried cherries.
5. I used walnuts, almonds or hazelnuts are also suitable - according to your taste.
6. Chop the nuts arbitrarily - you can finely, you can slice.
7. Wash the lemon thoroughly. Using a fine grater, remove the zest from the lemon (only the yellow part).
8. Squeeze the juice from the lemon - 20 ml of juice for the dough, and set aside 20 ml for the cream.
9. Dried berries, rinse, dry and chop to taste.
10. Sift flour into a bowl. Then sift the cocoa powder (adjust the amount to your liking - you can add more or less).
11. Add salt, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, ground ginger, nutmeg (optional).
12. Add chopped nuts. Mix well with a spoon.
13. Lastly, take care of the zucchini so that they do not have time to let out a lot of juice.
14. Wash young zucchini, cut off both sides and grate on a medium grater. Zucchini can be peeled, but I haven't.
15. In another bowl, combine eggs and sugar.
16. Beat well with a mixer for 3-4 minutes. Add vegetable oil and sour cream. Whisk well again for 1-2 minutes.
17. Add grated zucchini. Mix with a spoon.
18. Add lemon zest and lemon juice to taste - I added 20 ml.
19. Add cherries and dry ingredients. Mix well with a spoon. The dough is ready!
20. Turn on the oven to preheat to 180 degrees.
21. Lubricate the baking dish with butter, line the bottom with parchment (I have a form with a diameter of 23 cm). Pour half of the dough into the mold and send to the oven preheated to 180 degrees. Bake the cake for about 20-25 minutes, until golden brown.
22. After the time has elapsed, remove the cake from the oven and let it cool slightly for 5 minutes.
23. Carefully remove the cake from the mold and place on a wire rack. Cool down.
24. In the same way, bake and cool the second cake.
25. Prepare cream. To do this, put cream cheese in a bowl, add powdered sugar.
26. Beat well with a mixer until smooth.
27. Melt chocolate - on a steam bath or in a microwave (turn on for periods of 30 seconds and watch that the chocolate does not burn). Chocolate should be the consistency of sour cream.
28. In a separate bowl, combine cream, icing sugar and lemon juice.
29. Beat the cream mixture well with a whisk.
30. Add cream cheese to chocolate.
31. Mix chocolate and cheese well. Add butter mixture.
32. Mix well with a mixer until smooth - the chocolate cream is ready. Cover the bowl with a lid or cling film and refrigerate for 1 hour.
33. Collect cake.
34. Put the first cake on a flat plate. Put half of the cream on the cake, evenly distributing and leveling well.
35. Put the second cake on top. Grease the top of the cake with chocolate cream. If desired, you can lubricate the sides.
36. Decorate the cake to your liking (I sprinkled with almond petals) and refrigerate for 2-3 hours.
37. Chocolate zucchini cake is ready - you can serve.
38. Enjoy your meal!