Chocolate Chip Zucchini Cake — 💚🤤 The best zucchini cake ever!! Soft, moist, and you can’t even taste the zucchini! Tastes like a yellow bakery cake drenched in chocolate!!
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It’s zucchini season and if you make one dessert with zucchini this year, this is the one. Ironically, if you couldn’t see the green flecks, you’d hardly even know zucchini was included.
Chocolate chips are woven throughout the cake and chocolate ganache is poured over the top. What your tastebuds tell you that you’re eating is super soft yellow bakery cake with chocolate galore.
The ganache is so easy to make and comes together in about 1 minute in the microwave. Chocolate chips, cream, and vanilla. It’s so simple to make but tastes so decadent and the ganache stays a bit soft and silky even over time.
My family and I loved this chocolate chip zucchini cake and because it’s made with zucchini I kept telling myself it’s healthier. Which of course justifies eating seconds and thirds.
Ingredients for Chocolate Chip Zucchini Cake
To make the zucchini bundt cake with chocolate chips, you’ll need the following easy-to-find ingredients:
Zucchini cake:
- Eggs
- Granulated sugar
- Canola oil
- Sour cream
- Vanilla extract
- All-purpose flour
- Baking soda
- Salt
- Shredded zucchini (see the FAQ section for tips on wringing the zucchini)
- Semi-sweet chocolate chips (I prefer using mini chocolate chips because they sink less and stay more evenly distributed within the cake.)
Chocolate ganache frosting:
- Semi-sweet chocolate chips
- Half-and-half or cream
- Vanilla extract
Note: Scroll down to the recipe card section of the post for the ingredients with amounts included and for more complete directions.
How to Make Chocolate Chip Zucchini Cake
- Whisk together the wet ingredients, then add in the dry.
- Gently stir in the shredded zucchini, followed by the chocolate chips.
- Turn the batter into a greased and floured 12-cup bundt pan.
- Bake the zucchini bundt cake until top has set, is lightly golden browned, or a toothpick comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs but no batter. (Due to the chocolate chips, you may hit some chocolate patches with the toothpick test.)
- Once the cake has cooled, top with homemade chocolate ganache.
Storage Instructions
At room temp: This zucchini chocolate chip bundt cake will keep airtight at room temperature for up to 5 days.
In the freezer: Freeze cake WITHOUT the chocolate ganache on top for up to 3 months. I suggest wrapping it in plastic wrap and then sealing it in a freezer bag for added insurance against freezer burn.
Cake FAQs
If you’d like to make a classic zucchini bundt cake, you may omit the chocolate chips. However, my family loves when I make this as a chocolate zucchini bundt cake loaded with chocolate chips and topped with ganache!
No! You don’t have to peel zucchini before shredding it and adding it to the cake batter.
I baked the cake in a 12-cup Bundt pan, but it can be baked in a 10-cup Bundt because it’s not a very ‘tall’ cake and wouldn’t overflow a 10-cup pan. You’d probably have success dividing the batter between two 8-by-4-inch loaf pans or as muffins but I haven’t played around with it.
You can use sour cream or plain Greek yogurt in this recipe — use whichever you have on hand! You can even use mayo, but be sure to omit the salt if you go that route.
Yes! Wring the zucchini out in paper towels before adding it to the batter or it could release too much water as it bakes, which would make the batter too soupy and the cake may not set well.
Like bananas or pumpkin, zucchini is fabulous to bake with because it imparts so much moisture into baked goods and so it’s impossible to have a dry cake. Between the oil — which keeps cakes and muffins softer, springier, and more tender than butter — and the sour cream, this cake is supremely moist, soft, and fluffy.
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Chocolate Chip Zucchini Cake with Chocolate Ganache
Ingredients
Cake
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup canola oil, (or vegetable oil)
- ¼ cup sour cream, lite okay (or Greek yogurt may be substituted)
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt, (or to taste)
- 1 ½ cups shredded zucchini, loosely laid in measuring cup then wrung-out very well in paper towels*
- 1 cup semi-sweet mini chocolate chips, (regular-sized may be substituted)
Chocolate Ganache
- ⅔ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips, (I used regular-sized)
- ¼ cup heavy cream , (or half-and-half)
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
Make the Cake:
- Preheat oven to 350F. Spray a 12-cup Bundt or tube-cake pan very well with floured cooking spray making sure to get in all the nooks and crannies or grease and flour the pan; set aside.
- To a large bowl add the eggs, sugar, oil, sour cream, vanilla extract and whisk to combine until mixture is smooth and silky.
- Add the flour, baking soda, salt, and stir until just combined; don’t overmix or cake will be tougher. Batter is thick by design to handle the moisture from the zucchini.
- Add the zucchini and stir to combine. It’s important that you wring the zucchini out in paper towels before adding it or it could release too much water as it bakes, turning the batter too soupy and cake may not set well.
- Add the chocolate chips (I find mini chips sink less and stay more evenly distributed within the cake).
- Turn batter out into prepared pan, smoothing it lightly with a spatula if necessary, and give it a slam on the counter to release any air. Bake for about 38 to 42 minutes (I baked 40 minutes), or until top has set, is lightly golden browned, or a toothpick comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs but no batter. Due to the chocolate chips, you may hit some chocolate patches with the toothpick test. Because the moisture content in zucchini varies greatly, and due to climate and oven variances, baking times could vary; bake your cake until it’s done.
- Allow cake to cool in pan for about 15 minutes before inverting and releasing cake from pan and placing it on a rack to finish cooling. While cake cools, make the ganache.
Make the Chocolate Ganache:
- To a medium microwave-safe bowl, add the chocolate chips and heat on high power for 1 minute to soften chocolate; set aside.
- To a small microwave-safe bowl or glass measuring cup, add the cream (I used half-and-half) and heat on high power just until it begins to bubble and show signs of just beginning to boil (don’t actually allow it to boil), about 45 to 60 seconds.
- Pour hot cream over chocolate and let it stand about 1 minute. Whisk vigorously until chocolate has melted and mixture is smooth and velvety.
- Add the vanilla and whisk to combine. Set aside for about 5 minutes, allowing ganache to cool and thicken a bit.
- Whisk mixture briefly before preparing to drizzle it over the cake. Ganache will set up a bit with time, but remains quite soft and drippy.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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The Best Zucchini Bread — Super moist, tender, loaded with chocolate chips, and so EASY to make!! One bowl, no mixer, and THE BEST zucchini bread you’ll ever try!!
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Zucchini Banana Bread — Soft, super moist, easy, no mixer needed! Jazz up regular banana bread by adding zucchini and it’s healthier, too!
Carrot Zucchini Bread – Fast, easy, one bowl, no mixer!! Super soft, moist, and tastes so good you’ll forget it’s on the healthier side!
Glazed Lemon Zucchini Bread — 🍋🎉🍞 This EASY, no-mixer homemade quick bread combines tangy lemon flavor with tender zucchini which keeps it so incredibly soft, tender, and moist!
great
Not only is this the best zucchini cake ever it is the best cake ever!!! So yummy!!!
Not only is this the best zucchini cake ever it is the best cake ever!!! So yummy!!!
Thanks for the 5 star review and glad it gets the title of best zucchini cake AND best cake ever – what high praise and thank you!!!
What an awesome way to use up my zucchini! Thanks!
Wow! This cake looks amazing Averie! So moist and gorgeous and that chocolate ganache – you know that’s a thing of mine right? Yeah, irresistible. Pinned!
Thanks for pinning and ganache is a thing of mine, too! Wish it wasn’t….Lol!
I never thought to put a zucchini bread in a loaf pan.And covering it with chocolate ganache? Even better. Love it! Pinned!
Thanks for pinning!
I am in love with this!! It’s the prettiest thing EVER. Pinned!
I just saw your FB comment, too. With all the zucchini you have, this would be a winner for them. It’s seriously the easiest cake ever, too. One bowl, no mixer, whisk it up, done. And omg I had to donate some before I ate it all myself :)
This cake looks so incredibly delicious! I must try it soon!
Paige
https://thehappyflammily.com
Darn it! I’m outta sour cream (and Greek yogurt) although I do have a zucchini hiding in my fridge. Hmmm …. this sounds way yummy!
Do you have mayo? That would work, too. Don’t add salt if you use mayo. Trust me, I’ve made this cake (and many others) with a dollop of mayo, we’re just talking 1/4 c. What is mayo after all…oil + egg yolks :) Can’t go wrong in a cake!
This looks suuuuuper moist!! I recently had a chocolate zucchini bread donut at Nomad, and I loved it! So I’m sure I’d enjoy this cake as well!
Now that is a creative donut flavor and I’ve never been to that place! Probably better I don’t start :)
I love my zucchini cake with chocolate too, best way to get those veggies!
Last year I had a case of the giant zucchini that just wouldn’t go away, haha! I think I made about 8 recipes with it, and still had to throw some out because I just couldn’t use it all up.
That’s too funny! I’ve seen some of those monster zucchinis before and they truly do become huge!
Not that I care, but if you want to not see the green, you could always peel the zucchini. That might be a good hint for moms sneaking veggies in.
Totally true but with all those chocolate chips I was like, well the green looks…pretty :)
Personally, the flecks of green are my favorite part. They add so much awesome color. And with river on chocolate on top, it’s like a healthy Willy Wonka cake! :)
a healthy Willy Wonka cake! :) <---- Love that and so true!
I love bundt cakes– they look fancy but are easy! This one looks sooo good and ganache is the perfect finish. It’s barely 7am here but I could totally have a piece of this with my coffee right now!
Paula this cake is SO EASY. It’s a one-bowl, whisk together cake. Same method as most of my cakes and blondies and brownies. Super easy but as you said, looks fancy! And I loved this cake SO MUCH!