HEAVENLY & HEALTHY CARROT CAKE

Carrots are a great source of potassium, folic acid, magnesium and carotenoids. But in most carrot cake recipes the cups full of sugar, refined white sugar and butter make the final product a gut-buster.

That’s why I was thrilled with this fantastic, no-added sugar recipe for carrot cake (the frosting is made with maple syrup but I used Stevia instead and it turned out great). Wish I could take credit for the recipe but hats off to Christina Pirello, host of Christina Cooks and author of four best-selling cookbooks. Check out www.christinacooks.com for more healthy recipes.

18 CARROT CAKE

–2 Cups Whole Wheat Flour
–2 tspns Baking Powder
–1tspn Baking Soda
–¼ tspn Sea Salt
–1/1/4 Cups Spring or filtered water
–1/4 Cups dates, coarsely chopped
–1Cup Raisins
–1 tspn Cinnamon
–½ tspn ground Ginger
–Scant pinch of Cloves
–Scant pinch Nutmeg
–½ Cup Carrot shredded
–½ Cup Walnuts
–1/3 Cups thawed Orange Juice Concentrate

“CREAM CHEESE” FROSTING

–½ Cup Vegetarian Buttery Spread (like Earth Balance softened)
–¼ Cup Soy Milk, Rice Milk or other non-dairy milk
–3 Cups granulated Maple Syrup ( like I said, you can use abut ¼ tsp of Stevia to sweeten instead)
–1/2 tspns Vanilla
–Pan toasted walnuts for a garnish (who has time for garnish? I didn’t even bother taking the cake out of the pan before attacking it with my fork)

DIRECTIONS:

–Preheat oven to 350 degrees and lightly oil a 9-inch springform pan

–In a small bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt – set aside

–In small saucepan, combine water, dates, raisins, cinnamon, ginger, cloves and nutmeg. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes

–In a large bowl, place shredded carrots, pour the hot liquid mixture over the top and allow to cool completely.

–Add the walnuts and orange juice concentrate to the carrot mixture and blend well.

–Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir well.

–Pour the batter into the prepared springform pan and bake for 45 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.

–While the cake bakes, make the frosting. Use a hand-held or stand-up mixer. Place the spread, soy milk, half the maple granules and vanilla in a bowl and whip until smooth. Add balance of maple granules and whip until fluffy.

–If you follow the rules, allow cake to cool for 10 minutes before releasing pan and carefully transfer cake to a plate (I thought it tasted quite good burning hot from the oven

–Cool completely. Frost and garnish with walnut pieces.

Makes one 9-inch cake. 6-8 servings (Get real! This estimate must be for people with lots of willpower or very small stomachs).

Dessert is served!

xo,
Health Sundae

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