Carol's Easy Carrot Cake Recipe

Here's a very easy carrot cake recipe.

I can't claim to have made it with my own home grown organic carrots - yet! But I'm sure the day will come.

The one shown above is made with organic carrots and organic eggs.

Organic ingredients for carrot cake

Some supermarkets now stock relatively cheap organic carrots, at least, in the UK.

Most of the other ingredients for this easy carrot cake recipe should be easy to find from organic sources. We get most of our organic nuts and vine fruits from the local food co-op. Other carrot cake ingredients come from the health food shop.

What makes this carrot cake recipe easy?

Most of these carrot cake ingredients can be measured in a jug! You just need a jug with accurate volume measurements in millilitres.

Making carrot cake with oil does impart a slightly different flavour to the cake. Choose a fairly bland tasting oil such as sunflower or mixed vegetable oil.

This easy carrot cake recipe was given me by Carol, who turns out a far more perfect version than I usually manage!

Ingredients

175 gm soft brown sugar

175 ml oil

3 eggs

225 gm grated carrot

100gm sultanas or other dried vine fruits

75 gm nuts (walnuts or hazels are good)

175 gm organic self-raising flour

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1tsp grated orange rind

Topping

I rarely bother with a topping, as I think the cake is already sweet enough. But many people like it, so here it is:

175 gm cream cheese

450 gm icing sugar

You can also use crème frais or yoghurt as a topping. Add it to the cake just before eating it unless you plan to eat the whole cake at one sitting!

Most of the smaller carrot cake ingredients can be substituted. Lemon peel can replace orange peel; nutmeg can replace cinnamon.

Method

Mix together the oil, the sugar and the eggs in a large bowl. You can use a food processor to speed things up.

Stir in the carrots, sultanas and nuts. If you are using hazels, give them a minute or two under a grill to enhance the flavour and so you can rub the brown skins away in a clean tea towel.

Mix together the flour, soda, orange rind and the spices. Now mix them lightly into the oil and egg mixture.

Put the cake mixture into a lined, greased tin.

Bake the cake in the oven at around gas mark 4 (350 degrees F, 180 C). When it is firm and springy to touch, then it is cooked (around 30 - 45 minutes).

Let it cool before adding the topping.

Using carrots in a cake enables you to cut down on the amount of wheat flour used, making the cake rather more digestible for many people. See the sidebar for books on cakes and cooking without wheat.

Carrots supply valuable vitamin A (carotene - which we make vitamin A from). They also supply a host of minerals and phyto-nutrients. See the page on growing carrots for more details on their nutritional qualities.

Easy carrot cake recipe:
Simple variations

You can substitute same banana for some carrots if you wish. I was bit low on carrots when I made the cake shown in the picture, so I used half a banana to supplement the ingredients. I thought the results were at least as good as normal - but perhaps it was just the novelty value!

I also use dates and walnuts in the fruit mix and reduce the sugar by around 30%. As dates are very sweet, this does not much reduce overall sweetness.

I'm sure there are plenty f other easy variations you could make to this very easy carrot cake recipe. I will be experimenting with increasing the fruit and reducing the flour next - so watch this space.

Growing your own carrots

Carrots are quite easy to grow. They can be grown as a patio crop and you can even buy seed specially for patio carrots.

If you want to know the basics of successful carrot growing, please see my page: Growing carrots for a colourful and nutritious crop.

If you have an easy organic recipe of your own you would like to share you can add it by using the "Add Your Tips!" button on the nav bar. It's really easy to use and you can add as much detail - or as little - as you want.

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