Gluten Free Carrot Cake with Tahini Glaze

This recipe for Gluten Free Carrot Cake with Tahini Glaze was sent to me by a favourite foodie and fellow recipe hoarder.

It was a screenshot of the recipe with the words, “my sister made this for tea and it is delicious”. I looked at the font of the recipe and knew I had seen it before and that I have the cookbook it’s from. It is Sabrina Ghayour’s Spiced Carrot, Pistachio & Almond Cake with Rosewater Cream from her book Persiana.

I have to confess that carrots are not my favourite vegetable by a mile, unless they are these Tandoori Roasted Carrots or as a carrot cake. With a cream cheese frosting (of course), sprinkled with chopped pecan nuts.

I tweaked the recipe to what I had in the cupboard. I did not have ready ground almonds so blitzed raw almonds myself, slightly coarser than what you get in the shops and I really like the rougher texture it yielded in the cake. I had 100g unshelled pistachios and that only yields about 60g once shelled, so made up the difference with almonds. And added a teaspoon of orange blossom water for floral note. Sabrina’s recipe calls for 200g caster sugar. I do think you can reduce the sugar to about 150g if you make the tahini glaze. For extra pretty, I sprinkled the top of the cake with dried rose petals.

The cake is delicious served as is with a dollop of whipped cream, the tahini glaze is purely optional but adds another layer of texture and flavour. It is a reasonably thin glaze so add more icing sugar if you want more of a frosting type of topping.

I hope you enjoy this recipe for Gluten Free Carrot Cake with Tahini Glaze and that it will become a firm favourite.

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Gluten Free Carrot Cake with Tahini Glaze

a delicous, nutty cake based on recipe from Sabrina Ghayour's book, Persiana

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Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 1 hour hr

Total Time 1 hour hr 20 minutes mins

Course Baking

Cuisine Baking

Servings 8

Calories 415 kcal

Ingredients

  

Carrot Cake

• 3 large eggs
• 200 g caster sugar (reduce by about 50g) if you make the glaze
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 200 g ground almonds
• 100 g medium dessicated coconut
• 2 heaped tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp salt
• 150 g butter, melted
• 1 tsp orange blossom water (optional)
• 2 large carrots, coarsley grated
• 100 g pistachios, roughly chopped

Tahini Glaze

• 100 g cream cheese, at room temperature
• 50 g tahini
• good pinch sea salt flakes
• squeeze lemon juice
• 150 g icing sugar (more for thicker glaze)
• dried rose petals to garnish

Instructions

 

• Preheat oven to 160 degrees C
• Line a 23cm cake tin with baking paper
• Beat the eggs, sugar and vanilla together in a large bowl
• Add the almonds, coconut, cinnamon and salt and give it a stir
• Add the melted butter and give a thorough mix
• Add the blossom water, carrots and pistachios and mix until evenly blended
• Spoon the batter into the cake tin and bake for an hour or until firm to the touch and a skewer inserted comes out clean
• Cool in the tin, preferably overnight
• Make the glaze by beating the cream cheese, tahini, salt and lemon juice
• Add the icing sugar until you have the desired consistency
• Garnish with the dried rose petals

Keyword carrot, gluten free, tahini