Carrot Cake

This recipe I have tried a number of times.  I feel James Martin recipes are fail-proof.  I have made the cake with the icing, and without.  With whole meal SRF and all purpose SRF.  With and without the nuts.  It is totally up to you. If you do put the icing, chill the cake, it tastes even better.

Ingredients -
Orange juice and zest  - 1 orange
Sultanas - 50 g
Sunflower oil + extra for greasing - 150 ml
Eggs - 2
Brown sugar - 140 g
Self raising flour - 170 g
Ground cinnamon powder - 2 tsp
Mixed spice powder - 2 tsp
Soda bi carb - 1 tsp
Carrots , coarsely grated - 140 g
Nuts ( optional - walnut) - 50 g

Icing -
Soft cheese - 200 g
Butter - 50 g
Icing sugar, sifted - 85 g
Cinnamon - pinch

This step - try doing it the night before - I never have - put the orange zest and juice in bowl with the sultanas.  Or stir in the zest, juice, sultana together and microwave for a minute and keep for a few minutes to soak.

Grease and line the base of a loaf tin ( 2lb tin)
Whisk the oil and eggs

Heat the oven to 180 C or 160C fan.

Mix the sugar, flour, mixed spice and cinnamon powder, soda bicarb in a large mixing bowl
Add the sultanas soaked in the juice and zest, grated carrot, nuts and oil-egg mixture into the dry ingredients.
Thoroughly mix with wooden spoon.

Pour into the prepared tin and bake for 1 hour or till skewer comes clean.
If you find the top of the cake beginning to brown too quickly, loosely cover with foil
Cool the cake in the tin.

Once cool, remove from tin.

Icing - with electric whisk, beat soft cheese, butter, icing sugar and cinnamon till smooth.  Spread over the top of the cake.  Decorate with walnut halves.

Carrot Chutney

I always seem to have carrots in the refrigerator. You can add it to any curry, sambar, vegetable rice and of course the salad.  But I have never thought of a chutney. Today, however, I had just the carrots and had run out of veggies, and when this post of the carrot chutney popped up on facebook, I checked the link and it led me to Cook,Click and Devour and the dish looked good. I liked the fact that there was no coconut.  We use a lot of coconut at home and I am always on the lookout for coconut-free dishes.  The chutney was simple to prepare and tasted amazing.  A wonderful accompanying side dish for rice, chapatis, dosa or whatever.... it is really good!

Ingredients:

Carrots - 3-4 medium - grated

Bengal gram dal (Chick pea/Channa) - 2 tbsp

Red Chilies - 1-2 

Tamarind paste- 1/2 tsp 

Asafoetida/Hing - A large pinch

Ginger - 1/4"

Oil - 2 tbsp

Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp

Curry leaves - few

Heat the oil in a pan

Add the hing followed by the bengal gram dal

Fry the dal a while. Just as it begins to change a shade of colour and a hint of brown

Add the grated carrot

Toss till the raw taste of carrot disappears

Put it all into a blender

Add salt to taste and the ginger

Blend to a fine paste, with a little water if necessary.

Put the blended chutney into a dish.  

Temper with mustard and curry leaves.  

Try it - it is amazing.

Note - you can substitute the red chilies with green chilies.

Harini of Cook, Click and Devour also adds that you can add onions or fresh grated coconut too.

Spiced Carrot and Lentil Soup

S made this wholesome soup.  It was delicious.  And we had homemade focaccia ( the Hairy Bikers recipe) and it was a complete meal.

The soup is from BBC Food Recipes.  Here goes -

Ingredients: ( Serves 4)

Cumin seeds ( jeera) - 2 tsp
Chili flakes - to taste
Olive oil - 2 tbsp ( any other refined oil will do too)
Carrot - 6 - coarsely grated
Split red lentils ( Masoor dal) 140 gms
Vegetable stock - 1 litre - or use a ready to use cube
Milk - 125 ml
Yogurt to garnish or if you don't mind the extra calories - cream works even better)
Salt to taste and pepper too

Heat a  pan and dry roast the cumin and chili flakes
( the jeera jumps around in the pan is when you stop)
Keep aside half the roasted cumin
Add oil, carrot, lentil, stock and milk
Bring to boil
Simmer till the lentils are cooked

Whiz with a stick blender or any blender will do - till smooth
Season to taste - you can also add some pepper
Garnish with yogurt or cream
And top with the roasted cumin that was kept aside

Serve with any kind of bread.

Carrot Ginger Soup

Urska made the Carrot Ginger Soup featured here. K says it was absolutely delicious !.  Thank you for sending me the picture and the link from Simply Recipes .  I love thick soups and plan to make it over the weekend.

Recipe reproduced from Simply Recipes - To serve 4-5 persons

Ingredients:

Unsalted butter - 3 tbsp
Carrots - 6-7 large carrots, peeled and sliced thin
White Onion - 2 cups - chopped
Salt - to taste
Ginger - 1 tsp - minced
Stock - 2 cups - either vegetarian or chicken
Water - 2 cups
Orange zest - about 3 large strips
Herbs - parsley, dill, chives or fennel for garnish

Melt butter in a pot over medium heat, cook the onions and carrot with occasional stirring until the onions soften ( takes 5-8 mins)
Do not let either the carrots or the onions brown - sprinkle a teaspoon of salt as they cook to prevent this
Add stock, water, ginger and orange zest
Bring to boil, simmer, cover and cook until carrots soften ( about 20 mins)

Remove the strips of orange zest and discard

Work in small batches.
Pour soup into blender and purée  till completely smooth.  
Take care to fill only 1/3 with the hot liquid and ensure that it does not spill over.

Check for salt and add more if required.

Garnish and serve with your favourite bread.

Carrot Cake

A recipe from BBC Good Food .  Slightly modified. It has been ages since I really baked anything.  For a while now, I have tried to adapt baked goodies to a microwave recipe so that I could satisfy a few my cravings! This is a favourite of A and I thought I would try it out.  It does not require any technique and could not be simpler. I made half the recipe and got a decent sized cake. The cake was not overly sweet which was nice.

Ingredients:
Muscavado Sugar - 175 gms  - I used caster sugar 
Sunflower oil - 150 ml
Large eggs - 3 - beat lightly
Grated carrots - 140 gms ( 3 medium)
Raisins/Sultanas - 70 gms
Grated orange zest of a large orange
Self raising flour - 175 gms
Baking soda - 1 tsp
Cinnamon - 1 tsp
Grated nutmeg - 1/2 tsp - sadly did not add this
Walnuts - 50 gms - crushed lightly

Frosting -
Icing sugar - 100 gms
Orange juice - 2 tbsp

Preheat the oven to 180 C

Grease and line a square cake tin

Mix the flour, soda and spices and keep aside

Take a large mixing bowl.
Put in the sugar, pour in the oil and lightly beaten eggs
Lightly mix with a wooden spoon.
Stir in the grated carrots and the orange zest and sultanas
Sift in the flour mixture into the bowl

Lightly mix in the ingredients till it is a homogeneous mass

Pour into the prepared tin.
Bake for 40-45 minutes till the centre feels firm and springy
Remove from oven

Cool in tin for about 5 minutes.
Remove and keep on wire rack till it cools

Beat the ingredients of the frosting.
Put into icing bag and drizzle in diagonal stripes across the cake. Let it drip down the sides
( I did not get the desired results with the frosting...maybe next time -the icing was a dull white - any tips here? )

Slice and enjoy.

Carrot-Tomato Salad

I love this salad.  VK makes this for me ever so often.  I can eat a huge bowl of it anytime.  You can go berserk with the garnishing, but I generally use only raisins so that I do not feel guilty about the huge amounts that I devour.

Carrots - 4 - use fresh, juicy carrots for best results - grated
Tomatoes - 2 large - finely diced
Green chilies - 2 nos - finely diced - you can use any other spice if you do not like to bite into these
Raisins - soak and add 
Oil for seasoning - 1/2 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Coriander leaves for garnishing
Lime juice - 1-2 tsp
Salt to taste

Toss grated carrot, diced tomatoes, super fine diced green chilies with salt
Add soaked raisins

Seasoning
Heat the oil, add mustard seeds, allow to splutter and add to the grated carrot mixture

Add lime juice
Garnish with coriander leaves

And if you wish with more nuts
Simple and tasty.  Eat as much as you wish.

Carrot Pickle - the instant variety

I found this on Just Homemade - and R had used some very colourful fresh carrots and the photographs were lovely and it seemed so easy.  For a change we had just seasoned curd rice for dinner and this seemed the right thing to make with it.  I used just one chili and maybe it could have just passed off as a tasty salad.  Call it what you will, but it is simple to make and tastes great.

Ingredients:
Carrots / Gajar - 1 medium - for best results use tender baby carrots - in that case use 2-3 nos
Green chilies - 2 nos - slit lengthwise
Mustard powder - 1 tsp - (I used a mixture of mustard and fenugreek seeds) - it is recommended that you use the yellow mustard
Lime juice - 1 tsp
Olive oil - 1 tsp
Salt to taste
Turmeric - pinch

Julienne the carrot
Add the rest of the ingredients.
Toss
Serve

As simple as that.
If it lasts beyond one meal. Put in bottle and refrigerate.  Said to last for 3-4 days.

Gajar Halwa with fewer calories

Gajar Halwa is a rich dish.  Lots of ghee, lots of khova, lots of cashew and raisins.  Now make it the healthier way :

Ingredients

Gajar ( variety of carrot) - 200 gms

Milk - 50 ml

Sugar - 50 gms ( to taste)

Ghee - 2 tsp

Cashew and raisins for garnishing - few

Peel and grate the gajar

Take a microwave bowl - put in the grated stuff with milk and put in MW for about 3-4 minutes

At this stage, I found the milk was a little too much, so I strained it and had it ( see I told you this is healthy!)

Add a tsp of ghee at this stage and pop into the MW again or use the stove - just to dry it out a little.

Take a seasoning spoon, heat a tsp of ghee.

Add the cashew and while it begins to brown, add the raisins.

Add to the prepared gajar.

Your halwa is ready.  And tasty too. Eat without guilt.

Beetroot-Carrot Curry

I adapted the recipe from a dish called Beet Gajor Chechki from here. The adaptation was mainly because I did not have certain ingredients (kalonji) and forgot the others( like the onion)! But the combination of beet and carrot is lovely.

Beetroot – 1 – cut into 1” strips
Carrot – equal quantity – similarly cut
Mustard – 1 tsp
Coriander powder ( dhania ) – 1 tsp
Cumin powder ( jeera) – 1 tsp
Green chillies – 3 -4 ( remember both carrot and beet are sweet) - slit
Turmeric - 1/2 tsp
Oil – 1 tsp
Salt to taste.


Parboil the veggies ( optional) - I did this for about 4 minutes in the microwave.
Take a wok, add oil
And the mustard and allow it to splutter
Add the parboiled veggies and green chillies
Sauté
Add the coriander, turmeric powder.
A little water, cover and allow to cook. ( The dish is actually a stir fry, but here again a deviation)
Once the vegetable is done ( do not overcook)
Add sufficient salt and cumin powder.
Stir.
Remove. 

Lovely combination.  Have it with rotis.