Carrot Cake
Today's post is for of one of my favorite readers, ~M. She requested gluten free carrot cake a while back and I post it now in honor of her recent graduation. I find this to be the perfect time of year for carrot cake. It's an ideal dessert for cookouts, picnics and graduation parties.
You may have noticed a new little feature on the sidebar of this website --in computer programming terms it is called the "democracy poll." Basically it is a survey that allows you to vote for the dish you would most like to see me post. The current competition is between Chocolate Cupcakes, Mango Chicken and "Candy" Bars, which by the way are winning. Go ahead, stop by and cast your vote for the recipe you would most like to see up here.
Update: The poll is now closed and removed from the sidebar. Thanks to everyone who voted!
In other competition, my spring has been filled with baseball. As I have mentioned, I am coaching my son's little league team and it is quite a hoot. We won again yesterday, though more importantly, the boys are playing as a team and have great spirit. It is somewhat amazing to see how focused 9 year olds can be and how supportive they are of each other. This coaching deal has been a real treat for me.
3 cups blanched almond flour
2 teaspoons celtic sea salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
5 eggs
½ cup agave nectar
¼ cup grapeseed oil
3 cups carrots, grated
1 cup raisins
1 cup walnuts
- In a large bowl, combine almond flour, salt, baking soda, cinnamon and nutmeg
- In a separate bowl, mix together eggs, agave and oil
- Stir carrots, raisins and walnuts into wet ingredients
- Stir wet ingredients into dry
- Place batter into 2 well greased, round 9 Inch cake pans
- Bake at 325° for 35 minutes
- Cool to room temperature and spread with coconut cream frosting
- Serve
What occasions in your life call for a good carrot cake? And what memories does it bring back for you? Don't be shy, let us in on it and leave a comment!
Posted on May 20, 2008 in desserts by Elana
you might also like: Honey Cake
or Pumpkin Cranberry Upside-Down Cake
site feed email subscription print friendly recipe
email this
62 comments
delicious this stumble it share on facebook tweet thisadd to google
Dear Elana,
This looks absolutely amazing ! I will definitely try to make it. I also made your grain free granola, it is the best I ever had.
Anina
Elana, this looks so wonderful!! And I need my healthy treats! Thanks so much!
Carrot cake is my first love and greatest weakness. You've encouraged me to go and check out ingredients I've never used before - never even knew what they were. Tomorrow is agave nectar shopping. Thanks.
I remember having lots of carrot cake throughout childhood, as it is one of my mother's favorite cakes. One year, I requested a Raw Carrot Cake, which was very good. Your GF carrot cake looks amazing... We are GF and have not really delved into the realm of cakes yet.. My birthday is coming up, this weekend actually, and I am going to have a GF Lemon cake with your Coconut frosting! Looking forward to it :) Thanks for sharing your recipes.
OH MY GOODNESS...YUM!!! I am meeting my Mother in NYC for a girls weekend. My husband will be left at home and I have an idea... what if I left his favorite cake of all time, a homemade carrot cake behind to keep him company? I have everything but the carrots and raisins... Once again, here I go. Thanks Elana for your inspiration.
Delicious pictures once again -- carrot cake is a family favorite and I'm always looking for alternative recipes and yours looks so yummy! is that the coconut frosting?
Carrot cake always reminds me my sister because it's her favorite! Though I'm sure she's never had it be this healthy before - I can't wait to try it out on her.
Oh my goodness; this looks absolutely amazing! Yum! Carrot cake will now forever remind me of my engagement. Shortly after my (now) fiance proposed we went to a store called "World's Best Carrot Cake" in Asheville, NC and bought one of their gluten-free carrot cakes. What a great way to celebrate :)
Anina -It's been too long, hope you are well, was just asking Tara about you the other day and she reported your news to me :-) Much Love, E.
~M -Many apologies for the blacklisting; thanks for reporting all of the technical issues to me each time they occur! Hope you like this cake.
gizmar Happy agave shopping; let me know how this turns out for you.
Heather -HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
Courtney -Have a great time in NYC and hope your husband enjoys the cake.
Nicole -Yes indeed, it is the coconut frosting, though I think this would also go very well with my cream cheese frosting.
Amy -If you do let me know how she likes it.
LIzzie -What a wonderful carrot cake story; thanks!
Guess what. I made the coconut frosting. It didnt turn out creamy and quite crunchy. I followed every step of your instructions and didnt skip a beat
Along with some morning coffee, I just had to get a slice of homemade carrot bread at my local coffee shop. I came home and spread the frosting. I was doubtful but it goes so well together! I have no hesitations on sharing this with a crowd.
Carrot cake is one of my favorites, and this one looks fantastic!
This cake looks fantastic. Carrot cake is my all time favorite and I'm always looking for new recipes.
Thanks!
THANK YOU!! I just made your carrot cake complete with the white coconut frosting and brought it as the gluten-free alternative cake to a birthday party. It was a huge hit! It turned out to be the only cake at the party and I was shocked to see all the kids (and adults) gobbling it up. I left out the raisins and the walnuts because my kids won't eat chunks- and the recipe was perfect! Thank you so much for sharing your hard work. I am loving your recipes!
I love that this has an almond base rather than some of the other alternative flours that have funky flavors. With the nut base maybe I will actually like the way this tastes...unlike any other gluten free, non chocolate cake that I've found so far. I just bought a whole bunch of carrots too, so I think this is on the docket for tomorrow!
moi -That's really strange that it turned out crunchy; though it seems like somehow it came out alright since you spread it on the carrot cake from the coffee shop...how did it all work out in the end? Did you discover anything that would be prudent for me to change in the recipe? I didn't encounter the crunchy problem in the 20+ test batches I did of this recipe though am so curious as to what you encountered and how it was fixed. Always love feeback. Thanks :-)
deborah -Mine too.
Zoe Francois -You're very welcome!
ali -You are very welcome; I love sharing my recipes and it is so great to get feedback such as yours about how they turn out and are received in other groups and settings. I also think it's excellent when people take a risk and adapt the recipe to suit their own needs; glad it worked out for you :-)
zebe912 -Did you make it yesterday? If so how did you like it --hopefully no funky taste; that's what I like about almond flour, it's not gritty or bitter. Thanks for your comment!
Well- I made it back safely from NYC. I only see my mother 1-2 times a year so our times together are extremely special to me. I actually grew up with my father so seeing love "manufactured" in the kitchen is somewhat foreign to me. As I am beginning to spend more time in the kitchen with these recipes, I see how the preparation of one meal can bring gratefulness, anticipation, joy, accomplishment and indulgence! I used to look at a cake in the kitchen as a temptation for me to fail. This morning I am eager to dine on a piece of this carrot cake only to experience nurture and love. For me, the ingredients we often see in your recipes are priceless. I can only imagine one day I will be riding my bike everywhere, but not skimping on the "elana-basics".
*What do you grease your cake pans with? I have tried Grapeseed Oil for my last 2 cakes, but this does not seem to be working so well.
*Also, I eagerly await to hear your innovative brownie recipe!
Hi Courtney -Thanks for another great comment; your writing is so descriptive and beautiful. Great to hear that you and your mother had a good time together in NYC. Hope the carrot cake was delicious and that you enjoyed every bite. Gosh, on the grapeseed oil, I haven't had any troubles with things sticking...do you let the cakes cool for 2 hours? That might help. If you are letting them cool all the way and they are still sticking then I am not sure what to do though would suggest experimenting with a light dusting of almond flour over the grapeseed oil. As you make more of my cake recipes, please continue to update me about this matter --I want to fix it! :-) Elana
Elana, I have a confession... I never wait for your recipes to cool! I get so excited at the fact that I made something and it is going to be healthful and tasty at the same time that I... Well, i just dig in! I think once I have a few of these cakes under my belt, I will not be so eager to assemble. This should do the trick.
Any suggestions about how to make the cake vegan? Egg replacer? Flax meal? :)
Courtney -You win "cutest comment" award for that one :-) xo Elana
sara kay -You will find the answer to this question and many other common questions in my FAQ's, though feel free to leave questions in the comments section any time and I will assist you. Thanks for stopping by!
Hi!
I have a quick minute to finally respond to the carrot cake recipe post..It was my birthday (May 20th) and I flew with my 10 yr old daughter to NY to be with my family and go to a party for a much loved 80 year old friend of the family. It was such a great thing for me to connect with folks from my past, (the 80 yr old has known me since I was 2!) and I wanted to do something special. Your carrot cake photo inspired me! I don't even go for carrot cake that much, never have! BUT!!! I am now a believer in carrot cake. I made such an outstanding cake that I had to covet the last piece (in the nick of time, too) in order to get enough of it! And everyone raved about it even after! My second one is now baking in the oven for my daughter's 4th grade teacher, end of the year, picnic party tomorrow! I love the coconut frosting with it, although I have to decide, my daughter wants a glaze instead. Hard call...do I make something I can eat or go with the requests....ahh, either way, I thank you again for the recipes that have helped me through a life changing "restrictive" diet. Unbelievable amounts of happiness through your good food ideas.
there, that ought to do for a while- I shared!
I have made simple bread and sesame crackers which give me great pleasure since I thought I'd never be eating those things on a grain-free diet. Over the last few months a lot of healing has happened and I am enjoying good health once again!! (after a long struggle with vague digestive trouble, failure to thrive, general malaise, I am getting younger at 48)
So, I do go on and probably could say more on the right thread? I don't know about threads enough to start one or go to one directly related to my "issues".. any advice?
Hope you're enjoying good weather, it sounds intensely bad in the midwest, hopefully Colorado is peaceful.
Jeanne
Jeanne -
Thanks for your comment and HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Yes, I too have not really been big on carrot cake though have gotten really into it with this recipe...I am so glad that you liked it and that it worked out well for your bday.
Per your comment about the restrictive diet, yes, there is so much that we CAN eat and I think we are all realizing that as we connect and comment over here. Comments such as yours inspire me and make me thankful.
I am not very familiar with "threads." Even though I have this website I am a middle aged techno-phobe. I would think if you wanted to start a thread it would be good to do so on the most recent post where there is a lot of traffic and just put out there whatever you wish to say and invite people to chat with you about it...
Thanks again for your sweet comment and congratulations on growing younger!
Elana
This cake looks incredible. I'm sure the almonds would taste amazing with the carrots. I'm not on a restricted diet but like to dabble in gluten-free when I can. Cool blog :)
Laura- Thanks for stopping by; I checked out your blog and really like it.
Elana
I just love your site! I was so excited to find all of the delightful foods:-) Your recipes have changed the way we look at "our diet". You have brought the joy of cooking and eating back into our home. I made this cake right away, and it tastes even more wonderful than it looks in the picture! My children and husband ate it all right out of the oven! Just had to say thanks...
Chrissy-
Thanks for your feedback! You are very welcome.
Elana
Dear Elana, I just made your carrot cake with your cream cheese frosting for my daughter's 15th birthday tonight. It was really delicious! I had to use "almond meal" bought at the grocery store rather than the almond flour you recommend because my daughter baked a bunch of banana bread yesterday and used it all up, so it didn't rise really well, but still was very tasty. Everyone agrees they like your cream cheese frosting better than the sugary version, it is so light and creamy and not overly sweet. You asked what memories carrot cake brings back. My father was diagnosed with celiac several years before I was diagnosed. He got a really horrible gluten free cookbook, an old one from the 50s by some lady named Hulda, that was about the only thing available when he was diagnosed. He put up with crumbly dry baked goods and mostly just ate rice cakes. When I was diagnosed (only a few months after my sweet 15yo daughter was born) I would not eat that stuff and looked for some good gluten free cookbooks. I fortunately found Betty Hagman's books, and next time my dad came to visit, I made him a REAL carrot cake just as good as any wheat based cake. He was so thrilled! After that, just about any time we visited, I would make him carrot cake, because it was his favorite. He passed away 7 years ago, just 2 weeks before my youngest child was born. He died from lymphatic cancer that is prevelant among celiacs who do not watch their diets (he was never as careful as he should have been). I miss him so much! So I always think of him when eating carrot cake.
Kathleen -Thanks for another great comment and for sharing your carrot cake story. Sorry to hear about your dad and thanks for the added bit of information about celiac and lymphatic cancer.
xo Elana
Hi Elana,
This recipe looks amazing and I would like to make this cake for my birthday, but I am allergic to almonds and eggs. I know it's not recommended to substitute coconut flour for almond flour in the same measurement as they are very different. Is it possible to use coconut flour or another GF flour instead? Also, could I use an egg replacer? I typically use the Ener-G one and have pretty good results although I've never used it for cakes.
Thanks you so much! I hope to be able to use this recipe.
Camila,
Thank you for your comment. I'm not sure if the ingredient substitutions you mentioned would work for this recipe. I've only used the ingredients listed. If you decide to experiment feel free to share your results here.
Elana
Elana,
I made the carrot cake and coconut frosting today. I'm new at this type of cooking. My cake didn't rise much but still tasted good. The coconut frosting is amazing! I really appreciate the time that you spend to share your experience and experiments with others. I have been trying to use the scd (specific carbohydrate diet) to help with several health issues. It is good to be able to find creative genius such as yours.
Bonnie -Thanks so much for your feedback; glad you like the frosting.
Just finished making this cake. My only regret is that I substituted Real Salt for the celtic salt, and it was WAY too much. I feel a bit stupid for not realizing how much I was adding. If anyone uses any other type of salt for this, only use 1/2 tsp!!! Besides that, the cake is BRILLIANT- it cooked beautifully and it's hard to believe there is no flour in it. I also blanched the almonds myself, then ground them in a food processor. They didn't get as fine as flour, but it's good to note that a blanched almond meal is perfectly fine for this recipe. My frosting did not get as thick as the picture shows, so I will have to tweak that a bit next time. Can't wait to perfect this cake!
Julia,
For the frosting, maybe try leaving it in the freezer a tad longer, that usually helps. That is great that you ground your own almonds.
Thanks for sharing all of your findings.
Elana
Elana,
Love you blog! Have you ever seen an organic almond flour??? Have you used it and what did you think? TU SO MUCH!!!
Jillian
Jillian -Unfortunately, there is no company in the U.S. that sells organic almond flour in stores.
Elana -
Just wondering - do you grate the carrots or shred them? It seems it would take a ton of time to grate them.
Thanks
I made this last night for my boyfriend's birthday (in a heart shaped cake pan:)) The cake turned out amazing! I had some trouble with the coconut cream frosting though, I think I was just impatient and didn't leave it in the freezer long enough. But even though the frosting isn't perfect, it's still very tasty! I think next time I will use your cream cheese frosting recipe with the carrot cake. Thank you for such deliciousness!
Laney,
I'm glad you liked the cake. You definitely need to leave the frosting in the freezer until it turns an opaque white.
Let me know if it works next time and/or enjoy the cream cheese frosting, that's my boys fave.
Thanks,
Elana
Can stevia or other natural sweetners be used in
these recipes? I've read some not so good things about agave syrup.
Thanks
While my kids were playing happily this morning I took the time to make this recipe. I experimented using almond meal from Trader Joes. I ground the meal in the food processor intil it was of a finer consistency, and somewhat fluffy. I poured the finished batter into mini muffin tins. About 15min in the oven and they came out perfect! This time I skipped the frosting, but next time I'll make the cake and frost it too. YUM! Thanks!
Lynn--I've used Trader Joe's (unblanched) almond meal for lots of Elana's recipes with great success. I never re-grind the meal and still get incredible results. I DO, however, usually end up using more almond meal than the recipe calls for, until the batter or dough resembles the consistency one would normally expect it to. Just thought I'd share, in case you dislike cleaning your food processor as much as I do :) TJ's does it again...
Hello,
We bumped into your blog and we really liked it - great recipes YUM!!! YUM!!!.
We would like to add it to the Petitchef.com.
We would be delighted if you could add your blog to Petitchef so that our users can, as us,
enjoy your recipes.
Petitchef is a french based Cooking recipes Portal. Several hundred Blogs are already members
and benefit from their exposure on Petitchef.com.
To add your site to the Petitchef family you can use http://en.petitchef.com/?obj=front&action=site_ajout_form or just go to Petitchef.com and click on "Add your site"
Best regards,
Vincent
petitchef.com
Hi Elana - we made the cake yesterday and thought it was awesome!...well, at least the parts that were baked right!....I underbaked it, even though I had it in the oven for 40 minutes.
Do you think the recipe would work as cupcakes? If so, how long would you bake them?
Thanks!
Michele
K, thanks so much for the Trader Joe's tip. I won't re-grind the almond meal next time. I happily buy everything I can at Traders and will continue this item.
Michelle, I made mini-muffins with this carrot cake recipe and they turned out fab!
Lynn - how long did you bake the mini-muffins for? And at what temp?
I'm not much of a baker.
Thx!
Michele
I made this recipe and the coconut cream frosting for my daughter's first birthday. She loved it and so did I! The only thing I changed was I used only 2 c. grated carrots and added 1 c. drained pineapple. Thanks for the delicious recipes! I love that the frosting looks like normal frosting.
Kristin -Great addition of pineapple! Yum. Thanks for sharing it with us :-)
Does anyone know if you use the same about of regular table salt for the sea salt? 2 teaspoons seems like a lot for this recipe of regular salt.
I modified this recipe to make apple spice cake this weekend- it turned out great. I used one large Empire apple (I made a half-recipe)- I've never shredded an apple before and wasn't sure texture-wise how it would turn out so I sliced it thin and then sliced into matchsticks. I omitted the raisins and reduced the salt to half. I still love the carrot version- it was one of the first of your recipes I tried after I found your blog last year. Thanks for sharing so much with us, I'm looking forward to the cookbook!
Hi,
Any idea how you would substitute regular sugar in this recipe? As we have a fructose intolerant person so they can't eat the agave nectar or honey.
Thanks,
Paul
Dear Paul, thanks for stopping by. Please see my faq's for the answer to this and other common questions. Also, you may wish to post this question in my forums there are lots of super knowledgeable people over there.
Well, I made the carrot cake for a friend's birthday this weekend and we all agreed, it was delicious. And when discussing what went into it I said it had a lot of all the food groups. Since I hadn't had dinner I had two pieces that night!
Everyone seemed to like the coconut frosting, but me. The nice thing about cream cheese frosting is that you don't have to melt it down and really see just how much oil is going into it... It kinda grossed me out when I made it. I only put a thin layer in between and on top, but my friend bought coconut milk ice cream and I thought that was a really good compliment if you just wanted to skip the frosting all together.
I know that it's hard to figure out nutrition amounts, but if there's a suggestion on how to do it for this cake, sans frosting, I would love to know how. Any suggestions?
marie, Thanks so much for your comment. Please see my faq's for the answer to your nutrition inquiry. You may also want to ask that question in my forums.
I made this cake last week and absolutely fell in love with it! Sooo good! I wanted to make it again this week but was lacking some ingredients. I currently have crazy amounts of squash coming from my garden that I didn't know what to do with so I decided to make your cake again with a different twist. I made a cranberry and squash cake with orange zest. Oh my... awesome both ways! You have definately made it into the family cookbook that I will pass down to my kids.
I tried the carrot cake recipe. Substituted crushed pineapple and coconut for the raisins. Turned out good- but very cinnamon-y. Is it really 1 Tbsp of cinnamon or meant to be 1 tsp?
thanks
Dara
Ps so glad I happened in on your site. I was looking for ways to work with coconut flour which seemed to be the "miracle" I was looking for. Your recipes have inspired me to get going and start messing with recipes again! Finding coconut is a bit blah on it's own- but feel mixing it with the almond flour might just do the trick. Will keep you posted. ciao
Just made this tonight! It was wonderful! :)
Take two for this cake worked a treat for me!! :) I used almond meal and it was great - made it for dessert and it was very well received. Yum.
YUM! I love carrot cake; it's my favorite. This carrot cake looks heavenly. I can't wait to make it. Thanks for the great recipe.
Your photograph makes your cake look so moist! I wish I could taste some right now! Delicious looking, Yummy!
I made the carrot cake and the coconut cream frosting. The cake was great, really great. The frosting didn't work right. Couple of things. The canned cocounut milk was separated into liquid and solid when I opened it, but I reconstituted it by mixing it with a whisk before using it. Everything else went right until the freezer step. At an hour and a half, the frosting was only turning white on the sides and of course, it was freezing, so I took it out and mixed it all up. It never got fluffy. It looked more like tapioca pudding. We ate it anyway. My goodness that Agave nectar is sweet. So, I would like to try this frosting again. What happened? What do I do different?