FN Dish – Food Network Blog: Go behind-the-scenes at Food Network featuring your favorite chefs, shows, recipes, events and more.

Paula's Best Zucchini Bread Recipe

We’re teaming up with other food and garden bloggers to host Summer Fest 2010, a season-long garden party. Each week we’ll feature favorite garden-to-table recipes and tips to help you enjoy the bounty, whether you’re harvesting your own goodies or buying them fresh from the market. To join in, check out awaytogarden.com.

With zucchini season at its peak, there’s no better way to celebrate than with batches and batches of zucchini bread. And if you happen to have a humongous specimen lurking in your garden, this is the dish for you – the seeds of larger zucchini are tough and dry, but you won’t even notice when it’s grated into bread. For a classic, down-home zucchini bread recipe, we turned to Paula, of course.

5 Reasons we Love Paula’s Zucchini Bread

1. 5-stars and 587 (and counting) reviews (“Best use of zucchini ever!” says Allison from New Jersey)
2. Small loves make great gifts – Paula bakes a batch to give
3. Not a single stick of Butter + a Veggie = Healthy? Maybe?
4. Cinnamon, nutmeg and pecans, oh my! Plus a chocolate chip version, if you have a sweet tooth.
5. It’s an obvious choice for breakfast, but also a welcome addition to cookouts and potlucks – breadbaskets everywhere.

If “classic” is too ho-hum for your culinary style, find inspiration from these 5 creative riffs from food bloggers.

Special Zucchini Bread from 101 Cookbooks

1. My Special Zucchini Bread from 101 Cookbooks. Secret ingredients include crystallized ginger, poppy seeds, lemon zest and curry powder!
2. Zucchini Bread with Roasted Red Peppers and Feta from Closet Cooking
3. Blueberry Zucchini Bread from My Baking Addiction
4. Chocolate Zucchini Bread from Joy of Baking
5. Try adding more veggies: Zucchini Sweet Potato Bread from Joy the Baker and Carrot Zucchini Bread from Coconut & Lime

More Cukes and Zukes with Family and Friends:

• Alison’s Amazing Zucchini Appetizer on Food2
• For Cooking Channel, Michelle shares 10 Things You Didn’t Know You Could Make With Zucchini
• See Cucumber Salad from Healthy Eats, plus lightened up Zucchini Bread
• Away to Garden: Cukes ‘n Zukes: Size Matters
• White on Rice Couple: Proscuitto, Sour Cream & Feta Stuffed Cucumbers
• The Sister Project: On Zucchini Excess
• Just a Taste: Cucumber Sesame Salad
• Tea and Cookies: Stuffed Zucchini, Zucchini “Noodles” and Pickles
  
• Gilded Fork: Summer Squash Dossier and Chilled Cucumber Mint Soup
• Food Philosophy: Cucumber Beauty Treatment
• SanDiego Food Stuff: Cucumber and Radish Confetti Soup and Zucchini Pancakes
• Eating from the Ground Up: Cucumber Mint Sorbet with Lime Shortbread
• The Wright Recipes: Cucumber Salad and
  Marinated Summer Squash Salad
• Tigress in a Pickle: 50 Ways With Cucurbits
• Sweetnicks.com: Indian Cucumber Wraps
• Tuscan Diva: Fried Zucchini Blossoms, and More

Join the conversation on twitter at #summerfood.