Baby Carrot Beet Cake with Cashew frosting – vegan

First birthday cakes are my favorites: I love finding a recipe that works both for the baby and for the rest of the family&friends.

As we are officially in spring, I think you will appreciate this lovely carrot & orange beet cake with cashews frosting. It’s super delicious! I would definitely suggest it for any birthday, at any age 😉

The cake is vegan, aka no dairy + no eggs. In addition to that is refined sugar free, I only used the natural sweetness of dried fruit and apple syrup (recently I’ve been using and loving the Dolcedi’ apple sweetener by Rigoni Di Asiago).

I recently fell in love with orange beets, I put them everywhere…and I added one to the cake mix too 🙂 I’m happy I did it because it very well balances the sweetness of the carrots.

The cake is super moist, you will be surprised. The reason behind are the almonds: they give moist and a lovely nutty touch.

The frosting itself should have a separate post 😉

I prepared a vegan cashews frosting. super simple and super creamy. it turned out so good that I spread the leftovers on some toast for breakfast, hi hi!

The overall combination (cake + frosting) is delicious.

As I was thinking about a 1st baby party, I simply prepared the cake in a rectangular shaped baking pan. I cut out a big square that I used to create a mini cake for the party boy/girl and I transformed the remaining cake in lovely cake bites for the guests 😉

Did I mention that the cake is super simple to prepare????

When you are organizing a 1st birthday (or any other birthday) party, the last thing you want to do is to spend one day preparing/decorating the cake 😉

Happy Birthday everyone!!!!

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Baby Carrot Beet Cake with Cashew frosting – vegan

Ingredients

Cake Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour 260gr.
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• ¼ tsp nutmeg
• 3/4 cup apple sweetener or maple syrup 170ml
• ½ cup homemade unsweetened applesauce 130gr
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 1 cup finely grated carrots 2 medium
• 1/2 cup yellow beet 1 small
• 1/2 cup almonds 90gr.
• 1/2 cup dried apricots 100gr.

Frosting Ingredients:

• 1½ cups cashews 140gr.
• ⅓ cup coconut milk 50ml
• ¼ cup apple sweetener or maple syrup 70ml
• 4 tbsp coconut oil 40ml
• 2 tbsp lemon juice
• 2 tsp pure vanilla extract

Decoration:

• one carrot

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350F/175C
2. Grease a 9" x 12" cake pan with coconut oil and set aside.
3. Peel the beet and the carrots, grate finely and set aside.
   
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6. Soak the cashews in warm water overnight or (if you do not have time) boil some water and soak them in hot water for half an hour.
   
7. Place the almonds in a food processor, blend for 1 minute. Add the dried apricots, blend for 1 minute. Set apart.
   
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9. Prepare the frosting: add all ingredients in a powerful blender and process 5 minutes, you will obtain a thick cream. Place in the refrigerator to thicken even more.
   
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11. Prepare the cake: in a large bowl add the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and mix.
12. Add the apple sweetener, the applesauce, and lemon juice, combine.
13. Add in the grated beet and carrots, than the almond/apricot mix, combine well.
    
14. Transfer the batter in the cake pan. Level the top using a spatula to even out the surface.
    
15. Bake in a preheated oven for approximately 20 minutes until the top becomes golden and a skewer inserted down the center comes out dry. Remove from oven and let it cool down completely.
16. Once the cake has completely cooled, cut out a square, as big as you want your baby cake to be.
17. With a knife cut out a round shape.
    
18. Remove the frosting from the refrigerator, place the baby cake on the baby cake stand and start frosting the cake with the help of a knife.
    
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20. For the decoration: peel a carrot. Cut out a cylinder. Make a V cut. Cut out the sides of the heart. Cut out the sharp angles to give your heart a more soft shape. Slice as many hearts as you need.
    
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26. Decorate the baby cake and leave some hearts for the adult cake.
    
27. Spread the remaining frosting on top of the adult cake
    
28. Decorate with the carrot hearts and some grated carrots. Cut the cake in small bite portions. I like to serve the adult cake in the baking pan like in the picture 😉
29. Enjoy and have fun at the party!!!