Carrot Cake YUMMY

I made a carrot cake for my Hubby's birthday and wanted to share the recipe with you.

My husband loves carrot cake. With a gluten allergy he can't eat carrot cake--just look at it and dream.  So I decided the time had come to experiment with my new love, gluten free oatmeal, and make him a cake for his special day.

I used raw, unbleached, unrefined sugar. It has more of a brown look (it does not have the molasses extracted from it, and it has an excellent flavor and tests good). It is lumpy so my first step was to blend it down in my husband's coffee grinder so it didn't make the cake or frosting lumpy.  I used this in both the cake and frosting instead of regular sugar or powdered sugar.

My next step was to take 2 cups of gluten free oatmeal and pulverize it into flour using my food processor. Most gluten free flours contain rice, which my son can not have, or they smell awful and give shoddy results because of all the fava bean. What is the point in cooking a cake if  you can't enjoy the batter, I ask you? There is no point. None. You must be able to lick every utensil clean at the end and take little tastes here and there. How else will you know that it is exactly what you want? You cannot do that with fava bean flours. If you do, I promise you will need a trashcan close by!  

• 2 cups  raw sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups coconut oil
• 2 cups oat flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 teaspoons gluten-free baking powder
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• 3 cups freshly grated carrots

Frosting...

• 1 stick of unsalted sweet cream butter (organic if possible)
• 1 brick of pasture cream cheese (organic if possible)
• 2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup sugar you grinded up.

Preheat oven to 350° F / 176° C

I made two round cakes.  One of mine fell apart. I tried to flip it too soon.  It will make two round cakes.

1. Cream sugar and eggs in a large mixing bowl with an electric beater or stand mixer. Add oil and vanilla and beat just until smooth.
2. Add in oat flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt,  beat until blended.
3. Stir in grated carrots and nuts. Pour the batter into prepared pans.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean.
5. While cake or muffins are cooling place butter, cream cheese and vanilla in a large mixing bowl and beat on high until smooth. Add sugar and beat until smooth and creamy.
6. When cake is cool frost. 

Make sure it's cool before you try to flip it out of the pan.  I tried to flip it out onto our cooling rack and it broke apart. One my children and I devoured it. The other we decorated for Hubby and ate it later. It is super good! You may decorate it with lovely nuts like I did or whatever your creative mind likes.