Surprise Carrot Cake for Blogger CLUE

Welcome to the March edition of Blogger C.L.U.E. Society.

clue

Each month, the members pair up around a central theme.  March’s theme just happens to be “Happy Easter” and my assignment just happened to be Rebekah from Making Miracles.  Rebekah is a remarkable person with remarkable recipes.

A quick “Easter” search on her site uncovered some great sounding recipes like Brown Sugar and Balsamic Glazed Pork, Jill’s Pork Tenderloin (wrapped in bacon, no less), and Pink Lemon Pound Cake.  All of these sounded perfect for an Easter dinner.

Then, I thought on searching for something made with carrots and voila!  I found the perfect recipe for this month’s theme:  Surprise Inside Carrot Bundt Cake.   Not only was the main ingredient carrots, but it also had a surprise inside, just like those ubiquitous plastic Easter eggs.

Carrot Bundt Cake

Sort of Surprise Inside Carrot Cake

Although my “surprise” seemed to be a little off center and too close to the middle of the cake, I was still very pleased with this delicious recipe.  (Can you make out the bit of purple in this cake?   More about that surprise later—keep reading.)

Surprise Carrot Bundt Cake
from Making Miracles

For filling:
1 (8-oz) pkg. Neufchatel (1/3 less fat) cream cheese
1/4 c. sugar
1 egg, beaten

For cake batter:
2 c. all-purpose flour
1 3/4 c.  sugar
2 t. baking soda
2 t. cinnamon
1 t. fine sea salt
1 c. coconut oil, melted
3 eggs (at room temperature)
3 c. carrots, shredded
1/2  c.  pecans

Preheat oven to 350 F.  Grease and flour a bundt pan and set aside.

Make the filling.  Combine cream cheese, sugar and egg, mixing until well blended. Set aside.

Make batter.  In a large bowl, whisk together dry ingredients. In a smaller bowl, whisk together coconut oil and eggs.   Add oil/eggs mixture to dry ingredients, mixing just until moistened.

Shredded Purple Haze Carrots

How do you like the color of these shredded carrots?

Fold in carrots and nuts. Reserve 2 cups of batter and pour remaining batter into prepared bundt pan.

Spoon cream cheese filling over batter.   Carefully spoon reserved batter over cream cheese mixture, spreading to cover.

Bake in preheated oven for  55 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pan carefully onto cooling rack.  Cool completely and then sprinkle with powdered sugar, if desired.

I slightly adapted Rebekah’s recipe by using coconut oil instead of vegetable oil and 1/3 less fat cream cheese.  I also used some still quite good but gnarly purple carrots from our late October harvest.

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Very gnarly but perfectly good Purple Haze carrots from our October harvest.

They were still resting comfortably in my veggie drawer and they gave the cake nice and Easter-like specks of purple.

Speck of Purple

Rebekah, thanks for a great carrot cake recipe.  My sister and I have a unspoken carrot cake challenge so I will have to make this for her the next time she visits.

I hope everyone has a wonderful week and a great Easter holiday.  (I, for one, am counting the days until Spring Break.   I only have three more days of school before a much needed week off.)

Please check out the other Blogger CLUE members and see what Easter dishes inspired them.

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