Bay Area Vegetarians

I had a craving for carrot cake last week, so I pulled up this recipe. It looked a little boring, but I figured it couldn’t be that bad…and I was in a hurry.

I decided to double it so I could bring one cake to the office and keep one at home to score points with the honey. I purchased twice the amount of carrots, and grated them in my food processor. Unfortunately, I did not purchase twice the other ingredients! The result? Keep reading for a carrot and lentil soup recipe.

The cake came out delish. In fact, it’s one of the best carrot cake recipes I’ve tried! Who would have guessed? I didn’t make the frosting. I followed the cake recipes just as it was listed and it came out moist and perfectly spiced. Yum. Just goes to show that fancier is not always better!

Grated carrots oxidize easily, especially if they’re not peeled (mine weren’t). So I had to use up my extras right away. I made a salad with grated carrots sprinkled in, but I still had a bunch left over. A heaping cup.

I scrounged in the cupboards and came out with one cup of red lentils, one potato, some ginger and some miso.

I brought 3 cups of water to a boil and added the lentils. Then I added the chopped potato. After that came back to a boil, I added 1 Tb fresh chopped ginger and all the carrots. About 10 minutes later everything was tender and creamy. I added 2 Tb miso and salt and pepper to taste. I blended it with a hand-held blender, but it would been good without that step. It made a wonderful soup. Rich and creamy, filling, super healthy. Red lentils cook down into a naturally creamy puree, so you never would have guessed it was a fat-free soup.

I ate carrot-lentil soup and carrot cake for the next couple of days, with carrots on my salads as well. I looked a little orange, but with a black dress and some rhinestone earrings it went over quite well. The husband didn’t notice because he was too busy scarfing down carrot cake.

Carrot-Red Lentil Soup

1 cup dried red lentils
3 cups water
1 large potato, diced
1 Tb chopped fresh ginger
2 Tb miso paste

Salt and pepper to taste

Carrot Cake

For the cake:
1/4 cup cinnamon applesauce* (or equivalent substitute for 2 eggs)
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 cup Earth Balance margarine, softened
1 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 cup sugar
1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/4 cup vanilla soy milk
1 cup finely grated carrots (or 1 large jar strained-carrot baby food)
1 cup walnuts, chopped

(If you don’t have cinnamon applesauce, use 1/4 cup applesauce + 1 tsp cinnamon)

• Preheat the oven to 325°F.
• Grease and flour a 9-inch square pan. Combine the first 9 ingredients, mixing well.
• Add the carrots and the walnuts. Pour the batter into the pan, spreading evenly.
• Bake for approximately 45 minutes. Cool before frosting.

Frosting
8 oz. nondairy cream cheese (try Tofutti brand)
1/2 cup Earth Balance margarine
2 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 1/2 tsp. orange extract

• Combine the cream cheese and the margarine.
• Slowly add the powdered sugar and stir to combine.
• Add the vanilla and orange extracts and stir to combine.

Makes 10 servings

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 at 8:30 am and is filed under Heart Smart Cooking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

Tags: carrot cake, carrots, Heart Smart Cooking, lentil soup, recipes