My oven broke on Friday. After meticulously designing my first rendition of the batter for this zucchini roll I peeked through the glass to confirm the oven temperature (jelly roll pan full of hopeful batter in hand) and realized something was definitely wrong. Within a few hours (and after a substantial amount of googling on my husband’s part as well as a visit from my dad) it was determined–my oven was dead. Since the majority of my baking for this blog is done Friday evening through Sunday (and I already had a full Sunday planned), this incident caused more anxiety and frustration than an oven should ever be able to incite in a human being, and the search for a new one began immediately. Then, when Zach and I finally decided on an oven that we liked (shiny, self-cleaning, stainless steel), we were told it couldn’t be delivered for three weeks. Three weeks was simply not a feasible option for us, so fortunately (thanks to the powers of the internet) we were able to find the same oven a just a bit further away, deliverable before the end of this week. After being told about the three-week wait time, several days without an oven suddenly didn’t seem so bad after all. So, now I’m waiting for my new oven (which I’m quite excited about) and am very, very fortunate that my parents and their fully-functioning oven live only 15 minutes away from me. This roll took too many attempts to get just right (I think I made it half a dozen times) and I am very grateful that my parents (and bake-happy siblings) allowed me to commandeer their counter and oven-space for such a long period of time. In the end, they were rewarded with this zucchini roll, which was eaten quite gratefully and quickly, and I hope considered a fair trade. The filling was fairly easy, a subtle variation of my well-loved cream cheese frosting. You can’t have a zucchini roll without this, zucchini and cream cheese go together perfectly, much like carrot cake and cream cheese frosting.
With oversized zucchini overwhelming gardens and farmers markets everywhere this time of year, it’s nice to be able to convert this beautiful, emerald-skinned squash into something other than the typical bread or grilled/sauteed dish. This zucchini roll offers a nice twist, a sweet, slightly cinnamon-y, zucchini flecked cake rolled around a cream cheese filling. I highly recommend that you make more than one.
More Recipes to Try:
Zucchini Bread Zucchini Muffins Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins
Enjoy!
