Not Just a Man's World

There are times when we all crave something sweet.  I’ve been eyeing up some of the many paleo baking recipes that can be found on the internet and finally decided that it was time to try one as a holiday and post-cutting period celebration (for not having given up during the cutting phase).

A site I am particularly keen on for paleo ideas is PaleoFood.com and this recipe comes from their baking page.

This was a fairly expensive cake to make, since I used ground almonds (the supermarket didn’t do big bags of nut flour) and almost half a jar of honey.  But it tasted so moist, light and flavoursome (unlike the dryness you sometimes get with a standard sponge cake) that it was a real treat and worth every penny.

Ingredients:
6 eggs, separated
8 tbsp honey (or a bit less)
1.5 cups (340g, or 2 medium-large) carrots, cooked and pureed
Zest of 1 orange
Juice of half an orange (or 1tbsp frozen orange)
3 cups (260g) almond flour or ground almonds

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 170C.
2. Beat the egg yolks and honey together in a bowl.
3. Add the pureed carrots, orange zest, orange juice and ground almonds and mix thoroughly.
4. Beat the egg whites in a clean bowl until stiff.
5. Fold egg whites into the egg and carrot mix.
6. Grease and line  a 9 inch diameter spring-sided cake tin and spoon the mix into the tin.
7. Bake for about 50 minutes until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.  Warning:  the cake may look a bit burnt on the top but don’t worry about this.
8. Leave the cake to stand in the tin for 15 minutes to cool before turning out onto a cake rack to continue cooling.

If you wanted you could add some sort of coconut frosting but it really doesn’t need it.  It is so moist that it’s delicious just as it comes.  It may look a bit burnt but it doesn’t taste it so it’s not a problem.

It’s also more than sweet enough, so if you don’t have so much of a sweet tooth you may want to cut back on the honey slightly, though my personal tastes would be to leave it as it is.

Storage:

We tried a few storage techniques with this (in the interests of scientific experimentation). 

• The cake remained moist while being left out on a plate for two days, despite having been cut. 
• It continued to keep well in a tin for about six days. 
• On the seventh day the flecks of carrot on the cut surface of the cake started to grow blue mould.
• On day eight the cake tasted mouldy all the way through.

Related posts:

1. Paleo recipes: banana bread
2. Paleo kitchen experiments: chocolate mousse
3. Paleo recipes: carrots with cumin and orange
4. Paleo kitchen experiments – pumpkin soup and seeds