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Vegan Carrot Cake Recipe. Vegan Carrot Cake Quick bread loaf with Cashew Cream Frosting. Moist, spiced with Cinnamon and Cardamom, full of carrots. Low oil. Soyfree Palmoil-free. Pin this Recipe Jump to Recipe
This week is amazingly busy. I was planning up the posts last week and realized that both Holi and Easter are this week. Carrots and Mangoes were my choice to appear on the blog this week. So lets get started with this super moist Carrot Cake.
This carrot cake is loaded with shredded carrots and pureed carrots. All that carrot with the spices like cinnamon and cardamom (because Cardamom!), some ginger, and a creamy cream cheese style cashew vanilla frosting make this an irresistible loaf. The loaf is a carrot cake quick bread with mild sweetness. Add spices of choice, some nuts and dried fruit, bake, then frost with an easy cashew cream vanilla frosting. This is an incredibly moist carrot cake. It tastes even better after chilling as the spices infuse the loaf. The frosting is cashews plus little sweetener, lemon and vanilla! I use my mini food processor to shred the carrots. That reduces elbow grease and time needed. Bake this loaf and tag me on Instagram. For a Gluten and Grain free version, try this. What are your plans for Easter?
Other Easter Recipes from the blog
- Carrot Cake Pancakes
- Carrot Cake Ice Cream with candied walnuts and roasted carrots
- Carrot Veggie Pilaf with shredded carrots.
- GF Carrot Cake – Gluten-free.
- Or use the 1.5 to 2 cups of dry ingredients from my gf pumpkin loaf to make this loaf gluten-free. Add 1/2 cup oats and 1 tbsp chia seeds as well to help hold the bread.
Mix the dry ingredients. Soak the shredded carrots in maple. Mix in the pureed carrots + apples. Mix in the dry to make a thick stiff batter. Drop into parchment lined pan and even it out.
Bake until toothpick from the center comes out almost clean.
Cool completely. Slice and serve or frost, slice and serve. Frosting Inspired by Wallflower Girl’s Cashew coconut flour frosting.
Video!
Vegan Carrot Cake Recipe
Ingredients
Wet:
- 2 cups loosely packed grated or shredded carrots
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- 2/3 cup sugar, i use a mix of regular and brown sugar. Add 2 tbsp more for sweeter
- 1/4 cup oil
- 2 tsp lemon juice
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 tbsp flax seed meal
- 1/2 of a small apple or 1/4 cup chopped apple or use 1/4 cup apple sauce
- 1/3-1/2 cup chopped carrots
- 1/2 inch fresh ginger, optional
- 1/2 cup water or non dairy milk, or use orange juice
Dry:
- 2 cups flour, I use 1 cup whole wheat and 1 cup unbleached white
- 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp nutmeg
- 1/4 tsp or more cardamom
- 1/2 tsp ground ginger
- 1/3 tsp salt
- 1/3 cup chopped walnuts
- 1/3 cup currants or raisins
Cashew Vanilla Frosting:
- 1/2 cup cashews soaked for 1 hour or overnight
- 3-4 tbsp water
- 1/8-1/4 tsp salt
- 2 tsp or more lemon juice
- 2 tbsp sugar
- 1/4 tsp vanilla extract
- 1-2 tsp coconut flour
Instructions
- Prepare your pan for baking by lining with parchment or greasing and dusting with flour. Preheat the oven to 365 degrees F / 180ºc.
- Grate or shred the carrots and transfer to a bowl. Add the maple, sugar, oil, lemon, vanilla and mix well. Let sit for 2 mins.
- Meanwhile Blend the flax, apples, chopped carrots, ginger with water until pureed. Add to the carrot bowl and mix well.
- In another bowl, whisk the dry ingredients until well combined. Transfer to the wet and mix until there are no dry flour streaks. Fold in the nuts and currants. The mixture should be a stiff-ish batter. If the batter is too wet/moist (depends on the carrots), add 1 to 2 tbsp more flour and mix in.
- Drop the thick batter into prepared loaf pan. Even it out on the top.
- Bake for 60 to 70 minutes or until the toothpick from the center comes out almost clean. Cool for 15 mins and remove from the pan. Cool for atleast another 10 minutes before slicing.
- Frosting: Blend the soaked cashews with water, salt, lemon, sugar and vanilla. Blend until smooth. (I use a nutri bullet small blender).Taste and adjust lemon, sweet and salt and blend. Add a 1/4 tsp white vinegar for stronger sour flavor. Add some cinnamon for a cinnamony frosting. If the mixture is runny, add 1 tsp coconut flour and blend it. Add more coconut flour if needed to get the desired consistency. Spread the frosting over the cake.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
So here’s an update. I used an 8×8 pan because I couldn’t find any size mentioned in the recipe. I used only all purpose flour but followed the recipe exactly. The cake got done in 50 minutes at 365 in a convection oven. The taste was fantastic but the cake itself was quite dense and rubbery. The top of the cake had baked to form a bit of a soft crust. It wasn’t a fluffy cake so I’m not sure what went wrong. Any suggestions?
This seems like either there was too much moisture in the batter(carrots also leak moisture during baking, so they prob leaked a good amount and there wasn’t enough flour to absorb that) or the baking powder is dead. I suspect the first, add more flour so that you have a stiff muffin batter and bake
Dear Richa
I made this cake today. I wasn’t sure what pan size to use so I baked it in an 8×8 pan. It didn’t rise as much as I hoped so maybe I’ll try a 9×5” pan next time.
The cake baked at 365 but it only took 50 minutes to bake. I had to take it out to prevent drying out. An inserted toothpick came out clean and dry. Can you suggest some tips if I think the cake is being overbaked?
Waiting for it to cool so that I can try it……taking forever! Lol
P.s. I subbed the flour out for all purpose flour because I didn’t want to make it gluten free.
The cake uses a mix of all purpose and wheat. I think it might have needed another 2-3 tbsp of all purpose
I think it might have overbaked. You can check sooner and also cover the cake pan with parchment after 15 mins of baking to prevent it from drying out
Made exactly as stated, in the exact amounts, this cake is amazing. However, each time I have tried to double the recipe, it turns out terrible. I’ve been baking for 30 years and can easily double and quadruple recipes when needed for family gatherings, but this recipe just doesn’t double right for some reason. I wish I knew why, but I’ll just keep making one batch at a time, because it’s an incredible carrot cake otherwise.
I think the moisture to flour ratio. You need a bit more flour and a bit less carrots and carrots add a lot of moisture