Paleo Wheat, Gluten & Dairy Free Zucchini Bread

I ran across this fabulous blog called Elana's Pantry She has recipes for all sorts of special diets. If you are restricted in any way, you should pay her a visit. I found a Paleo Bread recipe on her site that I have adapted to accommodate my special diet. I would never have known where to even start however without first finding a recipe that someone else had already proven, so I am very thankful for blogs like Elana's. 

This recipe is wheat, gluten and dairy free!

Paleo Zucchini Bread

I especially like this recipe because you just dump it in the food processor a few ingredients at a time, pulse, pour into your pans and bake. How easy is that? 

I wanted a little more volume to my bread because of the loaf pans that I had, the original recipe made a low loaf, very delicious, but not a large slice. So, I added two grated zucchini, they add volume without changing the taste much at all. If you want a banana bread, use one small zucchini and one banana per recipe, it's delicious! Remember I doubled my recipe so I used two medium sized zucchini this time.

I'll try to make this as simple as I can, but I made several substitutions to her original recipe because of my food allergies and sensitivities. I am allergic to egg whites, so I try to limit my egg intake. I used ground flax seed in water in place of half the eggs.(I doubled Elana's recipe). 

One TBS ground flax seed & three TBS water = one egg

I am sensitive to coconut, so I used Tapioca flour and Extra Light Olive Oil in place of the coconut flour and oil. I also have to limit my vinegar because of being extremely sensitive to yeast. Anything fermented is not a good thing. I used balsamic vinegar, it's aged instead of fermented. I'm not really supposed to have honey either, but hey...I gotta cheat a little sometimes. I love honey!

A gathering of everything.

All the ingredients

Remember I have adapted Elana's recipe to fit my diet, if you want to follow hers you'll need to follow the link at the beginning of this blog.

One more thing before I get into the recipe. I ground my own almond flour from plain almonds. If you do this you'll want to sift the flour before you blend it with the other ingredients. There will always be a few contrary chunks of almonds in there. I don't mind a little nuttiness in my bread, but I don't want big chunks. If there are some small pieces, I just throw them in there anyway. This bread will also be a dark bread because the almonds are ground with the brown coating still on the almonds, blanched almond flour is ground from the inside of the almond without the brown coating.

Paleo Zucchini Bread

This recipe makes two small loaves or one large

3 cups almond flour
4 TBS Tapioca or Coconut flour
1/2 cup flax meal
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 tsp baking soda
5 eggs 
5 TBS ground flax seed/meal in 15 TBS water( this takes the place of 5 eggs) If you can have the eggs, just use ten eggs if desired.
2 TBS Extra Light Olive Oil or Coconut Ol
2 TBS Balsamic or Apple Cider Vinegar
2 TBS Honey

Dry Ingredients

1. Place almond flour, tapioca/coconut flour, flax, salt and baking soda in a food processor
2. Pulse ingredients together
3. To substitute flax seed for half the eggs, mix 5 TBS ground flax seeds with 15 TBS water in measuring cup or bowl
4. Pulse in eggs, flax & water mixture, oil, honey and vinegar
5. Pulse in grated zucchini and banana if desired*(see special note below before doing this step)
6. Pour batter into a greased loaf pan. You can make two small loafs or one large with this recipe.
7. Bake at 350° for 45/55 minutes or until toothpick inserted in middle comes out clean. This will have a moist center unless you cook it longer. You'll have to be careful and not let it brown too much on the bottom and sides. If you cook this as one large loaf, it may take longer to cook.

No room for zucchini

*SPECIAL NOTE: Depending on the size of your processor, you may not be able to fit this double recipe in. I couldn't. I had to remove half the mixture after step 4 in order to add the zucchini. I poured half in a mixing bowl, pulsed the zucchini in the processor, then mixed it all in the bowl before pouring into the pans.

Batter ready to pour into pans

Nothing left to do but eat it!

Hope this give you some ideas on how easy it is to make your own bread even if you can't have wheat! This recipe is especially good with a banana included too. You can even add a few chopped walnuts and you have banana nut bread!

patti