Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread

This moist and rich chocolate chip zucchini bread recipe uses whole wheat pastry flour, molasses, and chocolate chips. It’s the perfect afternoon snack you can feel good about!

This chocolate chip zucchini bread will be your new go-to afternoon snack or dessert! It retains all of the moist, rich, delicious magic of a classic zucchini bread but has so much more flavor with the molasses, light brown sugar, and chocolate. It also has the added bonus of being made with whole wheat pastry flour for extra nutrients!

You can go the more traditional route with this moist zucchini bread or add some extra fun flavor with this pumpkin zucchini bread. You may just want another quick bread with chocolate, so make this chocolate chip banana bread or chocolate chip pumpkin bread!

Ingredients & Substitutions

• Large Eggs: Whole eggs allow you to emulsify all the oil into the batter, resulting in moist, not greasy, zucchini bread.
• Light Brown Sugar: Light brown sugar adds sweetness and a little moisture. This helps the bread stay soft and highlights the molasses flavor. Coconut sugar or dark brown sugar can be substituted if desired. 
• Vegetable Oil: Oil makes this quick bread exceptionally moist. Aim to use an oil that won’t impart flavor. There is enough oil in this zucchini bread to taste it so don’t use melted coconut oil or olive oil save that for these olive oil chocolate chip cookies! 
• Molasses: I use unsulphured molasses. It has a lighter, milder flavor. This adds all the warm, winter notes without the bite of blackstrap molasses.  
• Vanilla Extract
• Whole Wheat Pastry Flour:  I prefer Bob’s Red Mill Whole Wheat Flour Pastry Flour. If you can’t find or don’t have whole wheat pastry flour, you may substitute all-purpose flour or pastry flour 1 to 1. You can substitute regular whole wheat flour, just know it will absorb more liquid than the pastry flour, resulting in a denser batter.
• Kosher Salt
• Baking Soda and Baking Powder: The baking soda reacts with the molasses, and the baking powder reacts with the heat, giving you double the rise. This allows for a much more even and strong rise, giving you the perfect crumb.
• Zucchini: Use fresh grated zucchini! In season, zucchini can be extra watery, so if you feel you need to squeeze slightly using cheesecloth or a clean kitchen towel. 
• Chocolate Chips: Choose a chocolate chip that you enjoy for this and for my banana chocolate chip muffins! Sometimes the additives that allow chips to keep their shape once melted and cooled can affect the taste and mouthfeel. I also love Guittard, but they aren’t always available.

See the recipe card for full information on ingredients and quantities.

Variations

• Switch up the chocolate! You can use chocolate chunks or dark chocolate chips or pistoles for more melty chocolate pockets. You could also try white chocolate or milk chocolate. And maybe, for a less sweet variation, you can use bittersweet chocolate or semi sweet chocolate chips.
• Make it double chocolate. Sub ½ cups of Dutch processed cocoa powder for the whole wheat flour and make it a double chocolate zucchini bread! And if you love double chocolate as much as I do, check out this chocolate banana bread recipe! 
• Add some nuts. Toast and chop some pecans, walnuts, or macadamia nuts and fold them into the batter for some added crunch like I do in my date nut bread!
• Make it carrot cake! Take inspiration from my carrot cake cookies, sub the zucchini for grated carrots, and add some spices like cinnamon and ground nutmeg! But don’t stop there—be sure to top it with cream cheese frosting!

Professional Tips

• Grate the zucchini. Use the medium side of the box grater for the zucchini. You can also use a food processor with a shredding attachment. 
• Use crisscross parchment for easy removal. Spray and lay one piece of parchment down with overhang, then rotate, spray and lay down one more piece of parchment with overhang. This will provide you with easy removal from the pan. 
• Emulsify the oil into the eggs and sugar. To ensure the chocolate chip zucchini bread is not greasy, whisk the eggs and slowly add the oil to create the best emulsion, just like in my olive oil cake.

How to Make Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread

Use these instructions to make this moist and flavorful chocolate chip zucchini bread! Further details and measurements can be found in the recipe card below.

Step 1: Heat the oven to 350°F. Grease an 8-by-8-inch square pan or loaf pan with baking spray. Line with parchment paper long enough to extend up the sides to use as “handles” for removing the bread once baked.

Use mini binder clips to keep the parchment from blowing onto the quick bread while baking. 

Step 2: Grate the zucchini on the medium side of the box grater. 

Step 3: In a large bowl, whisk the eggs, brown sugar, oil, molasses, and vanilla until smooth.

For the best emulsion, start by whisking the eggs, then slowly add the oil, followed by the sugar, molasses, and vanilla extract. 

Step 4: In a separate large bowl, whisk the flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder.

Step 5: Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and fold together with a silicone spatula until just combined.

For the most tender quick bread, add the grated zucchini when there is still a streak of flour. It will help prevent overmixing. 

Step 6: Add shredded zucchini and chocolate chunks; stir until just combined.

Step 7: Pour the batter into the prepared pan. If desired, top with a few extra chocolate chunks.

Step 8: Bake the bread for 40 to 45 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

An 8×8 pan will bake faster than a loaf pan, which will take closer to 50-60 minutes. 

Step 9: If using an 8-by-8-inch pan, cool the bread completely in the pan on a wire rack. If using a loaf pan, cool the bread for 20 minutes, then use parchment paper handles to remove it from the pan and transfer it to a cooling rack to cool completely.

Recipe FAQs

Before You Go

I hope you enjoyed this zucchini bread recipe. Check out our other delicious quick breads and muffins recipes, like these bright lemon poppy seed muffins or this perfectly spiced apple bread recipe!