How to Make Amish Flour (Zucchini Flour)

Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

Where I live, it isn’t unusual to see a horse and buggy or drive by Old Order Mennonite farms with horse-powered tillers and children tending gardens. We get to enjoy all kinds of vegetable stands, homemade chowchow and discover interesting finds like Amish flour.

Amish flour, or Mennonite flour, is homemade flour that is made from zucchini. It has a slight zucchini flavor and is a great substitution for some of the flour used in your baked goods. It’s also a fun and valuable way to use up all those extra zucchini from your summer garden!

Zucchini flour is easy to make and doesn’t require much hands-on time, but it does take a lot of dehydrating time. You’ll need a dehydrator or oven, a food processor or Nutribullet, and a means of storing your flour.

How to Choose Your Zucchinis

You can use just about any zucchini, but the smaller, younger fruits will have a more pleasant flavor. You can leave the skins and seeds on, too. You can use older, larger zucchinis, too, but you might prefer to remove the skins and seeds if you do.

I used eight medium-sized zucchini. Five pounds of zucchini will make about one cup of Amish flour.

How to Prepare Your Zucchini

Wash and dry the zucchini really well.

I cut my zucchini into ¼ inch slices. You can use a mandolin if you choose, but I decided to slice them by hand. If you slice your zucchinis by hand, just make sure you keep the thickness as even as possible, so they dry evenly. Then, I cut off the ends and any bruised parts and fed them to my goat. He was thrilled with the treat!

Alternatively, you can shred your zucchini with a cheese grater or food processor, whichever is easiest for you.

Set Up Your Dehydrator

Every dehydrator is different, so you’ll need to check your manufacturer’s directions. I have an Excalibur. I kept the screens in but took the fruit leather sheets out.

I spread the zucchini slices evenly over the trays. I had plenty of room to put in extra zucchini if I had more to use. Shredded zucchini will dry faster than slices.

According to my directions, I set the dehydrator to 125 degrees Fahrenheit. It took about 12 hours to dry it all out in the humid weather we’ve been having. If your area is very dry, it might take less time. Check it from time to time after about 6 hours.

To dehydrate your squash in the oven, set the temperature as low as possible and keep the door propped open about three or four inches. You may want to aim a fan at the oven door for air circulation to help the squash dry evenly.

Spread your zucchini out on a cooking sheet in the center of the oven and let it dry. It may take around two to five hours.

If you have an air fryer, you can dehydrate your zucchini slices in it. Then, just lay the zucchini in a single layer and watch it carefully.

No matter what method you use for dehydrating, you want the zucchini to come out like, then, crispy chips. But, if there is too much moisture content, they won’t grind up as well.

How To Turn Zucchini into Amish Flour

After you’ve fully dehydrated your zucchinis, then you can grind them.

I used a KitchenAid food processor, but you could also use a Nutribullet or blended.

Add a handful of chips at a time – or as many as your food processor can handle. I used the high speed and let the chips grind up. If this is too hard on your food processor, you can use the pulse setting, too.

A word of caution: if your food processor isn’t well sealed (mine wasn’t), you’ll get a fine layer of zucchini powder all over your kitchen! You might have trouble getting a flour-like consistency if your chips aren’t thoroughly dried.

You’ll have some leftover chunks and pieces that don’t grind up well. It might take a couple of tries to figure out just how dry your chips need to be. But you also don’t want them to burn.

How to Store Zucchini Flour

You can store your Amish flour in a mason jar with a tight lid. You may want to add a silica packet (don’t open or eat it!) to your jar or vacuum seal it. Moisture will ruin the quality of your flour.

How to Use Zucchini Flour

Zucchini flour can be used as a substitute for regular wheat flour in baking. It will add extra nutrients and fiber – and it’s a great way to snake in some vegetables! Keep in mind that it might add a green hue to your cookies and muffins.

Zucchini flour does not have gluten, like wheat flour, so it won’t ‘bind’ like traditional flour does. So you can only substitute at 25% to 30% of the flour in any baking recipe with Amish flour, or the recipe just won’t work out right.

If you find that your baked goods still don’t hold together well, you can add in some chia seeds to help it bind more. You also may need to add extra water, oil, or eggs because Amish flour absorbs more moisture than wheat flour.