20 Easy Zucchini Recipes to Use Up Your Bumper Crop

You have a mountain of zucchini. We have the solution.

Home cooks, food writers, and backyard gardeners may joke about the abundance of zucchini each summer, but sometimes it's not so funny when you're staring at a mountain of squash on your kitchen counter and no new ideas for how to use them.

We're here to make zucchini fun again with these 20 recipes. Yes, there's zucchini bread and muffins. There's quiche and a gratin. But there are also unexpected recipes like turkey meatloaf and a creamy one-pot pasta you're going to want to make right away.

Each of these recipes starts with a good amount of shredded zucchini to help you use up the abundance, and maybe sneak some veggies into your meals as well.

Zucchini Fritters

Can any food with the word fritter in it not be enticing? We think not. These fritters are full of shredded zucchini, flour, green onion, herbs, and lemon, with an egg to bind them together. Gently fried, they come out crispy and oh-so-yummy. A sour cream and minced garlic dipping sauce ups that yum factor!

Get Recipe: Zucchini Fritters

Cream Cheese Zucchini Muffins

Can you improve on the perfection that's a zucchini muffin, flavored with the warm spices of cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger? It's tough, but adding a cream cheese center takes them up a delicious notch.

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Zucchini Chocolate Chip Bread

Shred zucchini. Mix the shreds into a quick bread batter. Stir in tons of chocolate chips. Bake. No one will be able to resist this delightfully fluffy and moist chocolate chip zucchini bread that works for breakfast or as a snack.

Get Recipe: Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread

Zucchini Tomato Quiche

This quiche says summer, summer, summer. Zucchini, tomatoes, and basil are plentiful at the same time during the growing season. Use up what's in your garden, what you bought at the farmers market, or what was super fresh at the grocery store to make this quiche in an all-butter crust. (Or go ahead and use a pre-made crust. It will still be one of your fave quiches ever!)

Get Recipe: Zucchini Tomato Quiche

Turkey Zucchini Burger

Make your turkey burger juicy by adding shredded zucchini. Give it some zing on a bun with the smear of garlic mayo that's so simple to make. Just add garlic to mayo!

Get Recipe: Turkey Zucchini Burger with Garlic Mayo

Grandma's Zucchini Cake

Grandmas make the best cakes, don't they? This sheet cake recipe, from a grandmother of course, is full of moist zucchini, warm spices, nuts, and raisins. It's topped with a hard-to-resist cream cheese frosting. Take it to your next potluck or BBQ and watch it disappear.

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Zucchini-Feta Frittata

This frittata, made with shredded zucchini, potatoes, feta, and Monterey jack cheese, makes for great leftovers that you can eat cold. It's baked in the oven in a pie plate, eliminating the sometimes harrowing task of flipping over a hot pan to remove the frittata.

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Turkey Meatloaf

Ground turkey can be a little dry, but the genius trick to making sure turkey meatloaf isn't dry is to add shredded zucchini (and carrots) to add plenty of moisture. Plus, you get some added vegetables that technically, you aren't just adding to sneakily get your family to eat more veggies. You could bake this in a loaf pan, but it works really well as a free form meatloaf, too.

Get Recipe: Turkey Meatloaf

Creamy One-Pot Pasta With Zucchini

Here's a way of using up zucchini that you may not have thought of, and it's all done in one pot. Sauté shredded zucchini until it caramelizes and has a jammy consistency. Cook pasta and cream cheese in boiling water (yes, both at the same time). Add the jammy zucchini and lemon to the pasta and what has become a creamy sauce. Top with walnuts.

Get Recipe: Creamy One Pot Pasta with Zucchini

Zucchini Walnut Pancakes

Zucchini bread meats pancakes in this recipe for sweet, zucchini walnut pancakes made with whole wheat flour, tangy buttermilk, cinnamon, and lemon. Real maple syrup or a drizzle of thin honey is a must.

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Chocolate Zucchini Bread

If fresh garden zucchini is piling up in your kitchen, this bread is a life saver because it uses a whole four cups of grated zucchini. The addition of natural unsweetened cocoa takes it from yum to YUM, and instant coffee and almond extract intensify its flavors.

Get Recipe: Chocolate Zucchini Bread

Zucchini and Spinach Gratin

This classic French gratin is bursting with grated zucchini, spinach, and onions sautéed with bacon, parsley, and garlic, all bound together with eggs and Parmesan. It's a great side dish for baked ham.

Get Recipe: Zucchini and Spinach Gratin

Cheesy Zucchini Bites

These are kind of like tater tots, with no potatoes. Or broccoli cheddar bites, without the broccoli. Made in a mini muffin pan, these little zucchini and cheese-filled bites are perfect for breakfast, a quick snack, or a school lunch.

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Zucchini Carrot Bread

Take regular zucchini bread up a notch with the addition of shredded carrots for sweetness, freshly grated orange zest for brightness, warm baking spices, and a powdered sugar glaze. Top it all with grated coconut.

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Easy Zucchini Bread

Zucchini bread is so versatile, and this easy recipe has plenty of ideas for customizing this quick bread. Use gluten-free flour, if you want. Add nuts, or not. Add raisins, or not. Add dried cranberries, or not. You get the gist.

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Spicy Turkey and Zucchini Burger

Turkey burgers get moist (and kinda fancy pants) with the addition of shredded zucchini plus fresh herbs and dried herbs cumin and cayenne. Serve with a side of lemony sour cream sauce.

Get Recipe: Spicy Turkey and Zucchini Burger

Easy Zucchini Butter

Smear this savory, 5-ingredient spread on toast or sandwiches for easy lunches on hot days; or toss it with pasta, parm, and olive oil for a quick dinner. It keeps for about a week in the fridge and freezes well.

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Black Bean Burgers With Spicy Mayonnaise

This vegetarian alternative to the standard beef burgers of summer is full of black beans, veggies (including shredded zucchini), and breadcrumbs, bound together with an egg. They're super simple to make in the food processor and fry up quickly in a pan.

Get Recipe: Black Bean Burgers With Spicy Mayonnaise

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

When you're asked to bring a cake to the next summer gathering, this is the one to take. Made in a Bundt pan, it's flavored with chocolate, shredded zucchini, orange peel, and pecans, then drizzled with a sweet sugar glaze.

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Zucchini Bread With Pineapple

The options for adding flavor to zucchini bread seem endless. In this version, crushed pineapple adds sweetness and more moistness. This recipe makes two loaves. One for eating now, and one for freezing for later.

Get Recipe: Zucchini Bread with Pineapple

Read the original article on Simply Recipes.