Healthy Vegan Carrot Cake – easy and delicious
I have to admit that I have rarely been so happy with a recipe as with this vegan, gluten-free, and juicy carrot cake. After a lot of thought about how to make common recipes healthier, I’m very happy with the result and happy to share it with you! Like my vegan Easter bunny, it’s perfect not only for Easter but also for all other occasions.
My healthy version of carrot cake
As a nutritionist, I always try to make my recipes a bit “healthier” without tasting “healthy”. As we all know, the description “tastes healthy” is not always a compliment… 😀 Therefore, my goal is to create recipes that are healthier alternatives, while not sacrificing taste. Et voilà, the result is a vegan carrot cake that is packed with nutrients and contains lots of fibre to keep you satiated for a long time and prevent cravings. I also use oat flour (I often just blend rolled oats) and a good load of carrots, which provides the cake with antioxidants and beta-carotene.
Antioxidants not only help you fight harmful free radicals but also help you stay healthy in general by trapping and binding harmful substances in your body. In this way, they have been proven to help you prevent possible cell damage and thus effectively prevent cancer, Alzheimer’s and diabetes. Beta-carotene is also involved in the formation of vitamin A, which in turn plays an important role in our sensory perception. Not only our eyesight benefits from the beta-carotene in carrots but also our hearing and taste. Besides, vitamin A is an important factor in the formation and maturation of red blood cells in the bone marrow.
Long enough beating around the bush: Let’s start! 🙂
Equipment
- bowl
- ring tin or gratin dish – I use one with Ø 26 cm
- blender
Ingredients
Dough
- 250 g oat flour gluten-free
- 100 g protein powder optional, vegan
- 25 g baking soda
- 6 g cinnamon ca. 3 tsp
- 2 g nutmeg ca. 1 tsp
- 1 g salt small pinch of
- 120 g apple sauce
- 50 g birch sugar xylitol
- 150 ml oat milk gluten-free
- 100 g coconut oil melted
- 300 g grated carrots ca. 5 medium carrots
Icing
- 200 ml coconut cuisine
- 10 ml vanilla flavour or half vanilla pod
- 20 g birch sugar xylitol
- 5 g psyllium seed husks
Dekoration
- 30 g walnuts
- ½ carrot grated
- some mint
Instructions
Prepare the dough
- Finely grate the carrots and melt the coconut oil over low heat. Preheat your oven to 180° C top/bottom heat.
- Mix the dry ingredients for the dough – the oat flour, the protein powder (optional), the baking powder, the cinnamon, the nutmeg, the salt, the birch sugar – together in a bowl. Then add the apple sauce, oat milk, liquid coconut oil and grated carrots and mix until smooth.
- Pour the batter into your baking tin, smooth the surface and bake your carrot cake at 180° C for approx. 35-40 minutes. To be on the safe side, you can do the stick test.
Mix the icing
- After you have put your cake in the oven, you can start on the icing. Mix the coconut cuisine with the vanilla flavouring, a little birch sugar and the psyllium husks in a bowl. I help a little with a blender, but a mixer is just as good. The icing will seem a little runny, but the psyllium husks will slowly thicken the icing. Place your bowl of icing in the fridge to chill.
Frost your cake
- After your cake is baked, let it cool for at least 15-20 minutes. Then spread your glaze on it and put it in the fridge to cool for at least 30 minutes. Before serving, decorate as desired and most importantly: Enjoy to the fullest! 🙂
Nutrients
Alternatives and tips
As you can see, the recipe is very easy. First, mix all the dry ingredients, add all the liquid ingredients, mix everything together and bake the cake. In the meantime, mix everything for the icing. Let everything cool down well and pour the icing onto the finished cake. And for the eye, add a little decoration at the end. Super easy and sure to succeed!
As you can see, I don’t use table sugar, as it only provides empty calories and is anything but healthy. That’s why you’ll find apple sauce and birch sugar/ xylitol in my recipe, which even has positive effects. Alternatively, you can also use stevia or erythritol or some dates or simply more apple sauce. I also didn’t use sugar and nuts for the frosting. I use coconut cuisine and psyllium husks, among other things, to make it firmer and lighter in taste.
Where do you get your proteins?
Probably, you also wonder why I use protein powder! Of course, you can replace it with a little more flour. However, I would recommend that you consciously integrate proteins into your diet. Proteins are not only important for our body but vital. In addition, proteins keep you satiated for a long time and are indispensable for your muscles, blood clotting, your immune system, the formation of the body’s own hormones etc. Read more about why I take protein powder myself as a supplement. Personally, I love and recommend the protein powder from Go Superfood from Hamburg (ad, because I really love it!). And with “rosa” you get a 15% discount on your order.
Have fun baking and as always: Stay Nuts! 🙂
Yours, Rosa
You can find more recipes here.
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