Varying Zucchini Mini-Muffin Methods

I previously posted recipes for round and square mini-muffins, using zucchini that a co-worker provided from his summer bounty. I coarse-shredded it with my trusty Salad Shooter. I varied for pans—one type being round aluminum, and the other type being square-well silcone. As the batches were at least a week or so apart, it wasn't easy to contrast taste and texture results between them.

Since then, I baked another two batches, using both kinds of pans at the same time. One batch (upper part of pixstrip) had zucchini that I shredded, which another co-worker provided. (I have such sharing co-workers!) The most recent batch (lower part of pixstrip) had zucchini that I previously shredded, froze, and thawed.

Contrasting Round (Aluminum Pan) and Square (Silicone Pan)
For starters, neither recent batch of silicon-pan mini-muffins tasted of siliconey weirdness. As for different baking times, I encountered that issue in the most recent batch, when I positioned the baking pans differently from the batch before. More on that later.

The round mini-muffins look to have perfect crowns. The square ones, although also having crowns, seem to favor one edge over another. The slight lopsidedness might result from my not having sprayed the shots of oil as evenly into the squares as into the circles.

Contrasting Pan-Type Positioning in the Oven
The pixstrip shows the two different pan positionings in the oven. For the most recent batch, I placed the round-well aluminum pan on the bottom rack, closest to the oven element. The mini-muffins wound up browner and drier than the square ones, which were on the upper rack. (I had baked both batches at 350 for 15 minutes each, with pre-heating.)

Contrasting Fresh-Shred and Previously Frozen Zucchini
The thawed zucchini was very watery and less bulky than fresh-shredded. I poured and mixed in the entire thawed 8 ounces without draining the fluid. The batter was slightly easier to stir than when using fresh-shred. The results seemed the same as using fresh-shred. As noted, however, the pan positioning and timing seemed to affect the results.

Conclusion

• No significant difference between using fresh-shredded zucchini and frozen/thawed zucchini. Frozen means convenience for using the zucchini whenever, and without fear of having too much or too little fluid.
• If using metal pans, bake for a minute or so less than if using silicone. Or put the metal pan on a high rack.
• My silicone pans have more wells for area than the aluminum pans, making them more compact for quantity.
• It seems the silicone pans yield a slightly more moist result, but not by much.
• The slight downside of silicone is that it requires structural support (a metal pan) in the oven because of its floppiness.

Update—Another batch
Yesterday (Th September 4), I baked a batch of 12 round and 24 square mini-muffins—using one aluminum and one silicone pan. The frozen zucchini that I took down from the freezer the previous night had ice crystals in it. Thus, when thawed, was very watery. Although I didn't think to weigh the bagful, it didn't feel any fuller than the bagful that I used in a previous baking session.

The results, after 16 minutes of baking, were 12 round mini-muffins that were nicely browned at the edges and tan on the surfaces and 24 square mini-muffins that were pale and had a texture as though I steam-cooked them. Delish as expected!

Shot Salad Shooter Slicing Cone

My Salad Shooter, by Presto, is a small appliance that I use nearly every week, sometimes a couple of times a week. I've had it for maybe 20 years. Mainly, I use it for slicing carrots and olives. Occasionally, I use it for slicing veggies, especially for my veggie pasta recipe. I use it for chopping nuts and peanuts for making cookies and fudge. I used it for grating cheese in the past, but have since discovered the pre-shredded kind, so I don't salad-shoot-shred cheese no mo'.
My slicing cone is worn out, with some "fractures" that threaten to totally break it, as shown in the outlined areas of the pixstrip. I've done some searches for part availability and bottom-line cost. I've gotten the impression that comparison shopping is more difficult than in the past. Companies might now be less willing to let a viewer see total cost before requiring form filling. I think it might be a psychological nudge so that the visitor invests time and energy into filling information, and might be more committed to purchasing the item. In my online travels for finding a reasonable-cost cone replacement, I stopped at Mending Shed, eBay, and Presto.
Mending Shed
Mendingshed.com has an appealing price $4.95, but the shipping is $11.26, bringing the total to $16.21. Decided to pass on it. Furthermore, their form gave me four different options, but when I chose the post office, the tally screen told me they use only UPS. Hmmm. They could have disclosed that info on the first screen.
eBay
I was amused at the number of listings for a USED slicing cone on eBay. Something I'm going to use on MY food. Really! Not!
Presto
The starting Presto page for buying the part looked simple enough. I even inferred that estimating the cost would be simple. Nooooooo! After I reached the contact info screen, I saw that I needed a user ID and password as part of the form fill-in. Well, I decided I'd just send an email and request the shipping cost info, using the Contact link. Even that effort required more than meets the eye.
The contact page showed that I could use the form to email, or call an 800 number, or send snail mail. As the customer service hours availability didn't coincide with my own availability, I chose to fill the form. What a surprise that the Name field displayed "optional." The reality was that clicking the submit button triggered a you-gotta-give-us-a-name message. OK, so I went ahead and put in something. (Bleah. I dislike places that use contact forms for collecting data.)
The autoreply message that I received stated that they "will be in contact with you within 3 business days." Sure seemed like a long time for waiting for a reply to an inquiry. I think some other companies might have fancier inquiry forms where a consumer can pick a certain topic so the company's system can funnel messages to more specific topic buckets.
Mercifully, Presto got back to me that afternoon. The shipping cost would be $2 for the cone for anywhere in US and Canada. Woohoo! I placed my order. Wouldn't you know, the shipping cost is $3. OK, so I'll write the customer rep after I get my cone. Seems they could improve the customer experience by enabling the customer to more easily find out shipping info, especially a good shipping rate. A couple of more incidentals: ETA is about two weeks, and sales tax goes on top of the part AND shipping.
If anything unusual or unexpected occurs between now and the time my cone arrives, I'll put an addendum to this article. (I want to publish NOW.)