Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting (GF and Nut Free)

by whatchulove | Aug 21, 2014 | Recipes |

It was Paula’s last WOD at the box tonight *sad face* and I made her favorite cake for us all to enjoy after the work out. To cater for everyone’s diet requirements, the cake had to be gluten free and nut free. I was a bit nervous as the cake seemed quite hard unlike your normal fluffy non gf ones. This one turned out to be dense, moist and pretty yummy I must say – all the flavours were there! Of course if you do not have any nut allergies, feel free to add walnuts! I must admit though, that I did not miss the crunchiness of the walnuts like I thought I would. It just was a different version, in a good way. And no carrot cake is complete without cream cheese frosting so I made sure to slap 2 layers of it 🙂

Enjoy x

ps: Good luck Paula, we love you and will miss you muchly at Fibre.

Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting (GF and Nut Free)

Ingredients

1 cup brown sugar
½ cup raw honey
1 cup coconut oil
3 eggs
2 cups gluten-free flour (I used Woolworths brand)
1½ teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
sprinkle of Himalayan salt
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1 tablespoon nutmeg
½ cup milk
2-3 cups carrots, shredded ( 3 big carrots)

FROSTING
2 packs cream cheese, room temperature (use only one if you are not have a double layer cake)
1 teaspoon butter, room temperature
3 teaspoon raw honey (you can also use icing sugar)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees celcius
2. Grease and flour (with Pamela’s flour) 2 (9-inch) cake pans. Set aside
3. In a large bowl cream together oil, sugars, and eggs. Set aside
4. In a separate bowl whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon
5. Gradually add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, alternating with the milk
6. Mix just until fully combined (careful not to over mix)
7. Fold in shredded carrots
8. Pour batter evenly into prepared pans
9. Bake for 30 minutes until center is set (do not over bake!)

Frosting:
10. Cream together the coconut oil and cream cheese.
12. Add in the honey or icing sugar
13. Mix until silky and creamy.

14. When cakes are cooled, remove them from pan and frost.

Chocolate Cupcakes with Almond Meal (GF and SF)

by whatchulove | Aug 15, 2014 | Recipes |

What a glorious, beautiful and sunny Friday morning in Perth. Since there was some leftover almond meal from Wednesday’s baking, that called for some chocolate cupcakes. Almond meal makes these cupcakes moist with a beautiful crumb. You can add more honey to the recipe if you prefer your cupcakes more on the sweeter side 🙂

They took 5 minutes to make and are delicious and wholesome. I like them warm with a homemade strawberry sauce 🙂

Enjoy xx

Chocolate Cupcakes with Almond Meal (GF)

Ingredients

• 1 ½  cups (150g) almond meal / ground almonds
• ¼ cup (21 g) unsweetened good quality cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon gluten free baking powder
• 2 free range/ organic eggs
• 60 ml (1/4 cup)  macadamia nut oil, light olive oil, or cold pressed coconut oil (I used olive oil)
  
• 60 ml milk (¼ cup) your choice of dairy, almond or soy (I used cow’s milk)
  
• 2 tablespoons honey, maple syrup or rice malt syrup (I used honey)
  

Method

1. Preheat oven to 160 C – fan forced. 180 C no fan.
2. Combine almond meal, cocoa powder and baking powder.
3. Add the eggs, oil, milk and honey then mix well to form a smooth batter.
4. Spoon into 12 small individual cupcake tins.
5. Bake for 25 minutes until puffed and cooked through.

Persian Orange and Almond Cake (GF)

by whatchulove | Aug 14, 2014 | Recipes |

Baking is truly one of the things I love, it is a therapy, an escape, something I indulge in. It is so important to make time for things that make you happy. Simple things like exercising, baking and sitting in the sun contribute to my sanity. Everyone is different and we all have different avenues that contribute to our well-being.. Go ahead, do what you love, promote what you love. And do not go hating or judging others if they do different things to what you do. This had to be said 🙂

So this beauty here – sorry for the less than flattering night photo, is a very moist gluten free orange and almond cake. I’ve been wanting to make one in ages and it did not disappoint. It was more moist than I expected which is not a bad thing in itself (some prefer it that way) but go for less syrup if you don’t like the cake overly soft and wet. Or drizzle your syrup as you serve the cake. It is really easy to make and sooo worth the effort anyway. It’s YUM!

If you want to, you can easily substitute the sugar with honey. The original recipe had caster sugar – I used raw brown sugar instead.

Enjoy xx

Persian Orange and Almond Cake (GF)

Ingredients

Method

1. Preheat oven to 160°C. Grease a 20cm round springform pan and line the base with baking paper.

2. Place oranges in a large saucepan; cover with cold water. Bring to the boil and cook for 15 minutes. Drain. Return to pan and cover with fresh cold water. Bring to the boil. Cook for a further 15 minutes. Drain and repeat once more or until very tender. Drain. Coarsely chop and discard any pips.

3. Place orange in a food processor; process until smooth. Use an electric mixer to whisk eggs and sugar until thick and pale. Add orange, almond meal, baking powder, cinnamon and cardamom; gently fold until just combined. Spoon into prepared pan; smooth the surface. Bake for 1 hour or until a skewer inserted into centre comes out clean. Set aside in pan to cool completely.

4. To make syrup, use a zester to remove rind from orange. Juice orange. Place the juice, sugar and water in a saucepan over low heat. Cook, stirring, for 5 minutes or until sugar dissolves and syrup thickens slightly. Remove from heat. Add orange blossom water and zest. Set aside to cool.

5. Drizzle the cake with syrup.