Brazilian Carrot Bundt Cake

If your family needs more sweets in the coming week, here's a cake for Halloween. Although the cake isn't truly black and orange, it may be as close as one can come naturally. It nearly goes without saying that this can be baked any time of year.

As it stands, though, this cake will probably garner more adult fans since it isn't terribly sweet. Because it is another way to sneak a veggie into a treat, this recipe may be attractive to parents who bake. If you like something sweeter, consider adding chocolate chips to the batter or make the ganache with milk chocolate.

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Brazilian Carrot Bundt Cake

Source:  Food52

Yield: one bundt cake

I'm including changes for my altitude (4000-6000 feet) in parentheses. 

I haven't tested this, but if you choose to add chocolate chips for kids or adults who like more sweetness, I'd add about a cup of chips shaken with a tablespoon of flour to help them remain afloat in the batter. 

For the cake:

2 c (270 g) 1/2 inch carrot slices from 3-4 carrots, scrubbed but not necessarily peeled 

3/4 c plus 1 T neutral oil, vegetable or grapeseed

3 large eggs

1 3/4 c sugar (high altitude--334 g or remove 2 T sugar)

1 3/4 c flour (high altitude--260 g or add 2 T flour)

1 1/2 teas baking powder (high altitude--1 1/4 teas)

1 teas salt, table or fine sea salt

For the ganache:

6 oz (1 c) bittersweet chocolate, roughly chopped

1 teas honey

7 T unsalted butter, in half-inch slices

Heat the oven to 425F and place the rack in the center. Butter and flour a bundt cake pan.

Place the carrots, oil, eggs, and sugar into a blender. Blend until smooth (if you think your blender will need some help getting the mixture smooth, consider chopping the carrots smaller than half inch slices). Mix the flour and baking powder in a large bowl and stir well. Pour the carrot mixture into the bowl and stir with a spatula, making sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl, until no streaks of flour remain. If you want chocolate chips, add them now.

Place batter in the bundt pan. Pound the pan on a counter top a couple of times to remove any air bubbles. Put cake in the oven and bake for 5 minutes at preheated temperature and then lower the oven to 400F and continue baking for about 30 minutes. Test with a toothpick or cake tester and remove cake from the oven when the tester comes out clean or with a few crumbs.

Place on a cooling rack for about 10 minutes and then remove cake from the pan and allow to cool completely.

Place the chocolate, honey, and butter in a glass bowl and microwave on high for 30 seconds and stir. Repeat until you have a smooth mixture. It took about 3 repeats in my microwave. You may have to stir a few extra minutes after the last burst in the microwave to get remaining bits of chocolate to melt but it is better to spend time stirring than it is to overcook the chocolate. 

With the cake still on the cooling rack and over a baking sheet, spoon the ganache over the cake and let it sit until it has cooled before slicing and serving. I found the glaze was quite runny right after being microwaved so I repeatedly spooned over spots and attempted to cover all the cake. While it was still warm, I gathered glaze from the baking sheet and poured it on the cake. (There was still plenty of glaze left for a baker's treat.) If you prefer, you can just drizzle some glaze and leave some cake showing but in that case I recommend reducing the amounts in the ganache--possibly even halving the ingredients. 

The cake can be stored at room temperature in an airtight container--a large bowl can be inverted over a platter if you don't have a cake dome or carrier.