This post was inspired by an allergen-free mini carrot cake I made last year (and posted on my nutrition blog). That recipe was so tasty, I thought I’d adapt it to be low carb. I mean, Easter’s coming up, and who doesn’t want to have low carb carrot cake to celebrate? Carrot cake is also one of those things that just always says “spring” to me.
It’s a pretty straight forward, no frills recipe, though there are ways to modify it below, from chopped nuts and dried coconut to a lemon glaze. This is a pretty versatile base. It’s also nut free, grain free, dairy free and gluten free. So, yeah – carrot cake for everyone!
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Notes on Baking Low Carb Carrot Cake:
- These can easily be made vegan by substituting the eggs for chia or flax eggs. In fact, they’re based on a vegan recipe that did just that, and tasted awesome.
- These need to chill when they come out of the oven, for at least a half hour before you can even think about pulling them out of the pan. Baked goods made with sugar alcohols tend to need to cool a bit before they will set up. You don’t want crumbly carrot cake!
- You could easily add in a 1/4 cup of chopped walnuts, 1/4 cup of shredded coconut and/or 1/4 cup of dried raisins (if you’re feeling the need for more sugar) to jazz this up.
- To add a little punch of flavor, mix in the zest of one lemon.
- I love cinnamon. So much. If you’re not as big on cinnamon, feel free to halve the listed amount, or simply to exclude it altogether.
- I topped these with desiccated coconut, but you could easily make a glaze out of Swerve and lemon juice, or frosting out of Swerve, lemon juice and cream cheese. Now that I mention that, I’m thinking that’ll be next
Mini Low Carb Carrot Cake
Ingredients
- 2 cups of shredded carrots
- 2 large eggs (or two flax/chia eggs for a vegan version)
- 1/2 cup coconut oil
- 1/4 cup Swerve, or other granulated sweetener
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 cup coconut flour
- 2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp baking powder
Method
- Preheat your oven to 350F. If using a muffin tin, prepare 12 wells of the tray. If using this adorable mini bundt pan (or a similar one), no prep should be required.
- Add carrots, eggs, coconut oil, Swerve, and vanilla to your blender or food processor. Blend together until combined, though this doesn't have to be perfectly smooth. Small carrot chunks is totally okay.
- In a separate bowl, mix together coconut flour, cinnamon and baking powder.
- Pour the carrot mixture into the dry ingredients and mix until completely combined.
- Scoop mixture into the muffin tin.
- Bake for about 30-35 minutes, until the edges are golden brown.
- Remove from the oven, and let cool for at least 30 minutes before inverting on a cooling rack.
- Enjoy!
Do you think this would work as one larger cake? If so, what size pan would you recommend? Thank!
Hi Karyn! Good question – I think you could definitely make this into one larger cake. Either a 9″ round pan, or a standard loaf pan would work. If you wanted to make a full sized bundt cake, I think you would have to double the recipe and bake for at least 40-45 minutes (though, I’m not 100% on the timing!).
For other pan conversions, here’s a handy chart: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/264375440603989158/
Thanks so much for your comment! I’d love to hear how your cake turns out! :)
Liz