I’ve found that the easiest way to create a password protected zip file, is to use the freely available 7-zip.

C:\7z.exe a test.zip fileyouwantzipped -pPUT_PASS_PHRASE_HERE

7-Zip 18.05 (x64) : Copyright (c) 1999-2018 Igor Pavlov : 2018-04-30

Scanning the drive:
1 file, 13626 bytes (14 KiB)

Creating archive: test.zip

Add new data to archive: 1 file, 13626 bytes (14 KiB)


Files read from disk: 1
Archive size: 11376 bytes (12 KiB)
Everything is Ok

C:\

A pretty easy way to generate passwords/pass phrases is to visit: https://untroubled.org/pwgen/ppgen.cgi and change options as you see fit.