Friday, March 27, 2009

VEGAN CARROT CAKE




I needed a nice cake to bake for my Da's 75th birthday and I know he loves carrot cake, so I've adapted this recipe to suit. Da's not a vegan but he is a healthy eater. This is an insanely simple cake (though it’s a bit of work) and it’s low in sugar and fat per slice; it hits a few food groups too, what with the carrots, walnuts and flour. It’s positively healthy, I think!
(I know some vegans object to honey but Mr Vegan doesn’t, so I use it in this recipe.)
This cake is 'low-sized' - a euphemism for squat-looking - so if you really wanted to scrape and grate six carrots, you could make two, and sandwich them with vegan cream or butter cream.


For the cake

100 gr wholemeal flour
100 gr plain flour
100 gr light muscovado sugar
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg
100 gr vegan margarine
6 tblsps honey
225 gr (2 medium/3small) carrots, grated

For the lemon icing (optional)

Royal icing – I used 175gr
Finely grated zest of ½ lemon
15ml water
2 tsp (10 ml) freshly squeezed lemon juice
50 gr chopped walnuts to decorate

Method:

• Preheat oven to 160°C
• Grease and line an 8 inch cake tin
• Peel and grate the carrots
• Mix together the flour, cinnamon, nutmeg and baking powder
• Melt the marg with the honey and sugar, then mix into the flour
• Stir in the grated carrot and combine well
• Spoon into the cake tin and bake for 1 hour until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes, turn onto a wire rack to cool
• Make up the Royal Icing as per pack, mixing the lemon juice, lemon zest and water where the pack just says water
• When it’s cooled, ice the cake with a small spatula and dot with the walnuts before the icing sets

3 comments:

Group 8 said...

We tasted the cake on Saturday. Yum!! You know, you wouldn't need a second layer of it - it's dense and rich and filling with just the one layer. And the lemon icing turned out really well - bittersweet and zingy. Perfecto. I love it when a new cake comes together!

Kar said...

Hi N,

Love this carrot cake!
Decided to try it last night. It turned out perfect, delicious and light and moist. The wholemeal flour really makes a difference. The only hard part I found was grating the carrots, I’ve muscles on me muscles today, otherwise it was simple, easy to follow instructions ;-) and quick to make.
Unfortunately I made the icing a little too early and it set before the cake was ready to be iced, so I made a second lot of icing this time using cream cheese, (not for the vegan’s I know) but it turned out really well.
I’m off now this evening to try and prefect your Banana bread!
x

Group 8 said...

Great Kar - it's brilliant to get the feedback on the cake. The carrot grating is a pain, I know. My least favourite part...
I'm interested that your cake was light - mine was quite dense, almost heavy. Very filling.
I'm trying a new carrot cake for Mr Vegan's birthday. If it goes well, I'll send you the recipe!
I am now CRAVING carrot cake.
Nu x