Cake facts

Cakeformation you need to know

Carrot cake -  that unlikely yet winning combination of cake and vegetable. With its natural sugars and ability to bring delicious moistness to any dry ingredients, it’s perhaps not such an unlikely idea at all, but we salute the person who first dug up a carrot and then went renegade with the flour, eggs and sugar.

No one is entirely sure when carrot cake was first invented but food historians think it is likely to be a descendant of carrot puddings, which were eaten in Medieval Europe. By the 16th and 17th centuries, carrot pudding was being served either a savoury side dish or a sweet pudding with an egg custard. This would have been baked inside a pastry tart, like a pumpkin pie,  and served with a sauce. Other versions may have been steamed, more like a plum pudding, and served with icing, so you can see how the carrot pudding edged slowly but surely towards cake.

The exact point at which pudding morphed into cake no one is sure but it was certainly during World War Two that carrot cake as we know it today became popular. As Britain was urged to ‘dig for victory’ carrots were in much more plentiful supply than sugar, which was rationed, and they had the double benefit of being both a sweetener and a bulking agent in a cake. We imagine a slice went down very nicely with a strong cup of tea during a tedious afternoon in an air-raid shelter, too.

In our March issue, we have a recipe for the Chai Carrot Cake with rose and lime icing pictured above from Feasts of Veg (Kyle Books). Recipes & photography by Nina Olsson.

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More cakespiration…

More from our March issue…

Recipe: Hot cross carrot salad

This salad nods to its bun namesake with fruit and spice. Try it for Easter

Hot cross carrot salad

Serves 6
190g sultanas
30ml gin
Juice of 2 oranges
2 tbsp olive oil
4 bunches baby carrots, peeled and sliced into 1cm rounds
11⁄2 tsp ground cinnamon, plus extra for garnish
2 tbsp honey
Zest of 1 lemon
125g pistachios, lightly crushed
1 handful chervil, leaves picked for the yogurt dressing
6 cardamon pods
1 tsp fennel seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
375ml Greek yogurt
1⁄4 tsp fine sea salt

1 Place sultanas in a bowl with gin and orange juice. Allow to soak for at least 30 mins. Drain excess liquid.
2 Toast cardamom pods, fennel seeds and cumin in a dry pan. After toasting the cardamon pods, break them open, remove the seeds and discard the shell. Grind the spices using a pestle and mortar until a fine powder. Place yogurt in a bowl, mix in spices and season with sea salt and black pepper to taste. Set aside.
3 Blanch carrots in a pot of salted boiling water for 2 mins. Drain and set aside to dry.
4 Heat the olive oil in a shallow frying pan and cook the blanched carrots over a medium heat for 2–3 mins. Add cinnamon and fry for a minute longer. Add honey and allow the carrots to caramelise. Season with salt to taste and set aside to cool.
5 Toss carrots, sultanas and lemon zest together. Divide carrot mix onto individual serving plates and spoon over a cross of yogurt dressing. Sprinkle cinnamon on top and scatter over crushed pistachios and chervil.

From the April issue:

More salad recipes:

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View the sampler here