Low Fat, Lower Calorie Chocolate Courgette (Zucchini) Traybake
My chocolate courgette (zicchini) traybake is my lower calorie cake squares recipe. Butter-free, oil-free, free of refined sugar, these cake squares are made from wholewheat/wholemeal flour with only 2 grams of fat!!!**
Equipment
- Vegetable Peeler
- Grater (box shredder)
- Scales or measuring cups
- Measuring Spoons
- Medium mixing bowl
- Spatula or Wooden Spoon (or mixer)
- Sieve
- Whisk
- Tea-Towel
- Peg/Clip
- Jug
- Baking/parchment paper
- Spray oil, Cake release spray, etc for greasing (try Frylight or homemade lining paste/cake goop)
- 8-9" Square Cake Tin (20¼-23cm square tin *)
- Wooden Cocktail stick
- Cooling rack
- Small Bowl for glaze
- Large knife
Ingredients
For The Cake Batter:
- 210 grams Grated Courgette/Zucchini (210-240g/7½-8½ oz, or 1 cup grating/shredded*)
- 125 grams Wholemeal Flour (4½ oz, 1 cup, Wholewheat Flour)
- 1 tsp Bicarbonate Of Soda (Baking Soda)
- 63 grams Cocoa Powder (2¼ oz, ½ cup)
- 145 grams Coconut Sugar (5 oz, 1 cup, or Brown sugar*)
- 2 Eggs (Medium, Large-Extra-large US size)
- 170 ml Yoghurt (5¾ fl oz, ¾ cup, Plain/Natural, Greek-style etc,*)
- 2 tsp Coffee Granules/Powder (or Chai Latte powder *)
- 2 tbsp Boiled Water
For Decoration:
- 62 grams Icing Sugar (2¼ oz, ½ cup, powdered sugar, sieved)
- 30 grams Desiccated Coconut (1 oz)
Alternative Chocolate Pecan Version:
- 55 grams Pecans (2 oz, ¾ cup*)
- 15 grams Desiccated Coconut (½ oz, unsweetened shredded coconut, chopped*)
- 93 grams Icing Sugar (3¼ oz, ¾ cup powdered sugar)
- 1 tbsp Cocoa Powder
* denotes - see note below
Instructions
Prepare The Courgette/Zucchini
- Peel the skin & then grate/shred. You are looking for a weight of about 210 – 240g/7.5 – 8.5 oz or about 1 cup worth after grating/shredding.
- Place the 210 grams Grated Courgette/Zucchini in a clean tea-towel, close, twist & squeeze as much liquid out as possible. Keep closed with a peg or clip, place in a sieve & suspend over a bowl, leaving for at least 20 minutes.
Prepare The Cake Batter
- Sieve 125 grams Wholemeal Flour, 1 tsp Bicarbonate Of Soda (Baking Soda) & 63 grams Cocoa Powder over a mixing bowl or stand-mixer. Add any remaining bran pieces from the flour, directly into the bowl & whisk the dry ingredients together. Add in the 145 grams Coconut Sugar, mix and then place to the side.
- Measure out 170 ml Yoghurt, add the 2 Eggs and whisk together. **Note it will look a little ‘curdled’. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients & add the yoghurt/egg mixture. Briefly mix together, but not fully.
- Preheat the oven or air fryer to 180°c/160°c Fan Oven/350°f/Gas Mark 4. Mix the 2 tsp Coffee Granules/Powder or Chai Latte blend, with 2 tbsp Boiled Water & mix till dissolved. Add the concentrated coffee mixture to the dry ingredients & mix by hand or with a mixer, until everything is combined. Don't over-mix.
- Open up the tea-towel, remove the drained courgette/zucchini and add to the cake mixture. Fold in gently until coated in cake batter. **If adding pecans and coconut, fold in now - see notes below for amount).
Prepare The Cake Tin
- Grease a 23 x 23 cm (9″) square cake tin/cake pan on the bottom and up the sides, before completely lining with paper too. Do not try baking without paper. Grease with cake release spray, homemade lining paste/cake goop, or frylight cooking spray.
- Paper line properly by cutting the paper to fit better, use less paper and stop the paper falling and baking into the cake. See my lining bake tins lessons or the photo in the step-by-step instructions for how to cut a 'thick cross-shape' to fit any tin.
Bake The Cake
- Add the cake batter to the prepared cake tin, spread level, give a few taps on the counter/worktop and bake in the centre of the oven for about 20-25 minutes.
- The cake will be coming away from the sides of the tin and a cocktail stick comes out with a few wet crumbs. Don't over-bake.
- Leave to cool in the tin, on a cooling rack, for 10 minutes, then out of the tin for about 20-30 minutes.
To Decorate
- Prepare the icing/glaze by sieving the icing/powdered sugar into a bowl and adding very small drops of water (starting with ¼ tsp and moving onto ⅛ tsp), until you have a thick but pourable glaze. (See the video).
- Drizzle over the top of the cooled cake and sprinkle on coconut immediately. Leave to set for about 15 minutes at room temperature.
- For the pecan and chocolate version, mix up the sugar and cocoa powder, add water until you have a thick spreadable glaze. Simply spread on the top of the cake and leave to set.
Serving & Storing
- Once set, cut into 16 squares and serve. Low calories chocolate courgette/zucchini cake as is, but great with ice-cream too.
- Store in an airtight container at room temperature - metal cake or cookie tins are good. For the chocolate topping, loosely covered and not in the fridge is best. Will be fine for 3 - 4 days.
- The coconut topped cake can be frozen - whole or sliced, wrapped in baking/parchment paper, then cling film/plastic wrap or foil and then in a labelled food bag or airtight container, placed at the back of the freezer drawer, for up to 3 months. Defrost in the fridge till ready.
Notes
Ingredients & Alternatives
Sugar - Coconut sugar used but soft brown sugar works too. Use 1 packed cup (200g) as a substitute. Note the calories will increase. Yoghurt - any natural or plain yoghurt works, like Greek-style Yoghurt, even low fat. A tested alternative and vegan, is using a tin of mango pulp that Aldi sometimes stock.
Courgettes/Zucchini - weight or cup amount is after peeling and grating/shredding.
Coconut - Desiccated coconut is used, but finer than US unsweetened coconut, so ideal to just roughly chop. (See comparison photo in the Step-by-Step instructions before this Recipe Card).
Coffee - enhances the chocolate flavour & does not make the cake taste of coffee. Try using Chai Latte powder or a combination of this and coffee.
Alternative Version - try adding roughly chopped pecans & a little coconut to the cake batter. A chocolate fudge-like topping can be used instead of glaze and coconut, all amounts listed above. (You will see this version in some of the photos). *Note the calories will increase.
Recipe Yield/Tin Size - makes 16 cake squares, using a 9" (23cm) square cake tin. A rectangular tin can be used, but the width plus length added together, must not exceed 18" (46cm) or will be too shallow. Use a smaller tin and the bake time will increase.
Please see the step-by-step directions before this Recipe card for more details or watch the video.
'Lower Calorie' - with calories of 108 per glazed cake square, this is much lower compared to 'chocolate courgette traybake' & 'chocolate zucchini cake squares' that appear high on page one of these Google searches, as at 23/07/24.
Low Fat - with only 2g of fat per cake square, at about 57g per cake, this is just 3.5% fat. So considered very low fat, since butter & oil free, and assuming low fat natural yoghurt used. See below.
Nutritional Information - I am not a qualified nutritionist and all values are approximate. Calculations based on 1 serving of 1 cake slice, assuming recipe made as above with no alternative ingredients, (no nuts), using low fat natural yoghurt, & from a batch of 16 cake squares, and with the coconut icing glaze. Unglazed the cake squares are reduced to 88 calories per slice. All calculations via website MyFitnessPal.com. For all 'lower calorie', 'low fat' & coconut sugar information referenced in main post, the associated references are listed in the footnotes.
Nutrition Facts
Low Fat, Lower Calorie Chocolate Courgette (Zucchini) Traybake
Serving Size
1 slice
Amount per Serving
Calories
108
% Daily Value*
Fat
2
g
3
%
Saturated Fat
2
g
13
%
Sodium
890
mg
39
%
Potassium
94
mg
3
%
Carbohydrates
21
g
7
%
Fiber
2
g
8
%
Sugar
14
g
16
%
Protein
3
g
6
%
* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.