Vegan Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
I'm going to come straight out and say it, I don't like making carrot cakes.
Every time I've tried in the past, it's always been so tedious to get the carrots grated (yes I do own a food processor), and no matter what I try, the cream cheese frosting always fails. Miserably fails. I'm talking it fails so much it makes me grumpy.
I'll go ahead and let you in on a secret now, the cream cheese frosting failed miserably for this cake too. It was sooo runny and it just completely failed to stay on the cake and instead chose to fall off and create this sloppy mess. I managed to salvage the icing by taking a smaller amount of the icing and just adding loads of icing sugar. Some top tips I have found for making cream cheese frosting is to not over-beat the cream cheese, and my own personal tip is to have an endless supply of icing sugar available!
Anyway, let's talk about this vegan carrot cake. This recipe does omit one of the typically ingredients in a carrot cake, walnuts. However this is my own personal choice (well not really a choice) as I am highly allergic to all nuts! So if you're feeling like adding walnuts, feel free! Just know that's why I never use any nuts in my recipes. This recipe produces a really delicious cake, and from what I managed to salvage of the icing, a tasty icing too!
If you do have a food processor, it is so much less time consuming to use that to grate the carrots than grating by hand, although both produce the same result so really it's up to you which you choose to do!
Carrot cakes are a pretty heavy cake on the cake spectrum, so don't worry if you don't see your cakes rising much. I also highly suggest using a digital thermometer to check the internal temperature of the cake and using this to determine when your cakes are ready, when the internal temperature of the cake reaches 210˚ Fahrenheit, your cakes are done.
Another top tip is to let your cakes cool for a few minutes in the tins, then transfer to a cooling rack and gently remove the greaseproof paper (if used), as the cakes are really fragile when warm and might fall apart otherwise.
I realise I'm making it sound like carrot cakes are such a problem to make, and I don't mean to have it come off that way, I'm just being honest and letting you know some of the problems that you might come across when making them - it's always better to be honest!
If I haven't put you off making your own carrot cake and you do give this recipe a try, please use # so I can see your creations (and I really do hope you have more luck than I do!).
Total time: 1 Hour 15 Minutes plus Cooling Time
Yield: One Cake, Serves 6-8 People
Ingredients
Yield: One Cake, Serves 6-8 People
Ingredients
- 250g Plain Flour
- 1 Tsp Baking Powder
- 1 Tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
- 3 Tsp Ground Cinnamon
- 250g Grated Carrot
- 325g Brown Sugar
- 2 Vegan Eggs (I used Orgran Egg Replacer)
- 120g Dairy Free Butter (Melted)
- 1 Tsp Vanilla Essence
- 1 Tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
- Cream Cheese Frosting X
- 200g Vegan Cream Cheese (I used Tesco's soft cheese)
- 50g Dairy Free Butter
- 1/2 Tsp Vanilla Essence
- 550g Icing Sugar
- Preheat your oven to 180˚ Celsius. Grease and line two 7-inch round cake tins.
- Sift together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and ground cinnamon in a large mixing bowl.
- Fold in the grated carrot and sugar until the carrots are fully mixed in.
- Stir in the vegan eggs, then stir in the melted butter an vanilla essence.
- Finally, fold through the apple cider vinegar.
- Divide your mixture between your two cake tins.
- Bake for approximately 30 minutes.
- Allow your cakes to cool completely before icing.
- Begin by lightly (and I mean lightly!) beating the cream cheese and butter together, just a little to soften it up.
- Stir in the vanilla essence (again, as light as possible!).
- Fold in the icing sugar (add a little at a time), until you achieve a nice thick icing.
- Assemble the cake by sandwiching the two cakes with half the icing, then topping with the remaining icing.