This Vegan Zucchini Bread is light and fluffy - and it's packed with flavor from ripe bananas, cinnamon, and crunchy walnuts. Plus, it's easy to make, completely vegan, and gluten-free.
I love cooking with fresh produce - it just makes the food so much more flavorful and nutritious! So when I wanted to do a bit of baking this weekend, I took a look at what's in season right now.
And I found zucchini!
Perfect. Zucchini is one of my favorite veggies - there are so many easy ways to make it delicious. Some of my favorite zucchini recipes are zucchini cannelloni, zucchini quinoa salad, and this lemon cake made with zucchini.
But today we're going a little more traditional - zucchini bread. Vegan zucchini bread to be precise.
How to Vegan-ize Zucchini Bread
Traditional zucchini bread is made with ingredients like dairy, eggs, and honey. So I had to find a few substitutes to turn this zucchini bread vegan.
(First - make sure you've grabbed a copy of this free printable cheat sheet. It's packed with all my favorite easy substitutions to make any recipe vegan!)
I replaced the eggs with "flax eggs" to start with. What are flax eggs? They are simply a mixture of flaxseed meal and water. This is a great trick for vegan baking. Simply mix together 3 tablespoons of water and 1 tablespoon of flaxseed meal for each egg you are replacing.
It has a consistency similar to eggs, and helps hold everything together.
I was able to leave the dairy out entirely by using mashed, ripe bananas in the recipe. They give plenty of moisture for the bread, and also add a ton of delicious flavor.
The final substitute was the honey, which is typically used to sweeten zucchini bread. I replace it with agave syrup, which is a staple in our house. If you're not a fan of agave, maple syrup would also work well here.
And of course, I wanted to make this zucchini bread gluten-free also! So I used ingredients like gluten-free baking flour and almond meal as the basis for my dough.
Let's Make Vegan Zucchini Bread!
The trickiest part of this zucchini bread recipe is probably shredding the zucchini.
This whole process can be made a lot easier with the help of a spiralizer. Some food processors also have convenient shredder attachments. If you don't have either, you can also shred it with a cheese grater.
Once the zucchini is shredded, you can start working on your dough.
Start by mashing up a banana in a medium-sized bowl. Make sure you choose bananas that are nice and ripe, so they are easy to mash!
Then add all of your "wet" ingredients in with the bananas - that will be your agave, "flax eggs", and olive oil. Stir in the zucchini and set is all aside.
Next, work on your "dry" ingredients. Mix together your gluten-free baking flour, walnuts, baking soda, baking powder, almond meal, cinnamon, and salt.
Then, simply combine the two bowls of ingredients into one. Stir the wet ingredients slowly into the dry ones, until a thick batter is formed.
Spread the batter into a prepared bread loaf pan, and sprinkle with some extra chopped walnuts.
Bake everything for one hour, and it's done!
Want to experiment with more bread recipes? Check out my honey-roasted banana bread or super easy dill soda bread.
And don't forget to grab that free cheat, filled with the simple substitutions to vegan-ize any recipe!
Vegan Zucchini Bread- Gluten Free
Ingredients
- 1 large banana mashed
- ¼ cup agave
- 4 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tbsp flaxseed meal
- ⅓ cup water
- 1 ¼ cup shredded zucchini
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 ½ cup 1 gluten-free baking flour
- ¾ cup almond meal
- ½ cup chopped walnuts plus extra for topping
- Cooking spray
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325 degrees (F).
- Sray a loaf pan with cooking spray and set aside.
- In a small bowl, combine the flaxseed meal and water. Stir well, and set aside.
- In a medium dish, mash the banana.
- Combine the agave, olive oil, flaxseed-water mixture, and zucchini in with the mashed banana.
- In another bowl, combine the baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, salt, flour, and almond meal.
- Gradually combine the wet and dry ingredients in one large mixing bowl. Mix until smooth and well combined.
- Gently fold in the chopped walnuts.
- Pour the batter into the loaf pan. Sprinkle remaining walnuts over the top, if desired.
- Bake in the oven for one hour, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Once baked, let the zucchini bread cool completely. And enjoy!
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