Miss Roben’s Carrot Cake Breakfast

Miss Roben’s is a dedicated allergy-free bakery range from the US and now available in the UK. I posted about them here and they were kind enough to send some samples to try. I started with the carrot cake (well why not?) and accidentally developed a fab fruity breakfast!

On a day when I was feeling I needed something goodish but sweet, I thought I would try the carrot cake mix. Instead of making a cake, I used muffin cases and made 18 pretty large muffins. Goodness knows what size the cake would be! Making them is simplicity itself (as long as your whisk is working and the lid doesn’t blow off your food mixer like mine did. Harrumph.) You add oil, water and eggs plus some vanilla extract if you like, mix the whole thing really well, leave to stand, pour into muffin cases or tins and bake.

I was a bit worried about the amount of oil and sugar and think next time I will follow the advice on the packet and substitute some fruit puree to bring the levels of fat and calories down. However, this time, purely in the interests of research you understand, I did it as per the pack. Nothing whatsoever to do with the fact  was having a bad day and craved sugar, promise.

Anyway, they took a bit longer than the pack said to cook but then my oven is a bit rubbish, but I checked them with a long pointy thing and judged they were ‘done’ when it came out clean. They took about 45 minutes.  They sank a bit. I held my breath. They stopped sinking. Yay! A muffin.

Why so excited; it’s only a muffin? One: because I rarely have cake and am sad, and two: because it is made with NO GRAINS! Yep, impossible as it sounds, the cake mix is made with a base of potato and tapioca. Most people think tapioca is a grain, but actually it comes from cassava, a root vegetable. You might also know it as manioc or yucca flour. The rest of the ingredients are:

• Ingredients:  Tapioca Starch, potato starch, unrefined cane sugar, refined cane sugar, corn free baking powder (sodium acid pyrophosphate, potato starch, sodium bicarbonate, monocalcium phosphate), unsulfured dried carrots, cinnamon, nutmeg,guar gum, cloves.  
• Additional needed ingredients:  Eggs or acceptable substitute, oil, vanilla extract (optional), water.

No Wheat, Gluten, Barley, Oats, Rye, Dairy, Casein, Lactose, Whey, Peanuts, Tree Nuts, Egg, Soy Protein, Soy Oil, Fish, Shellfish, Sesame, Onion, Latex.

So, after I had noshed a muffin straight out of the oven and another one later, I realised they need to settle a bit and are better cold! I didn’t want to add more sugar as a frosting as suggested on the pack, but if you wish to, simply combine some water and icing sugar plain or with any flavour or colour you like and heat until melted, then pour on the top and leave to set. If you want to limit the frosting, a good tip is just to drizzle the warm sugar mix from a height off the end of a spoon and make a criss-crossy pattern rather than dollop a whole thick load on top. Unless you’re having a REALLY bad day.

The muffins are quite spicy as they contain cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves, which I liked actually although some might think them too strong. The only thing I didn’t like was the little bits of dried carrot which were still a bit hard and get caught in your teeth. Yum. I think perhaps if you  stirred the water in at the start and made sure it was mixed thoroughly and let it sit for a while to hydrate the bits better before adding the oil and eggs, that might work. I shall have to have another go to find out!

I think also I would only make half the pack next time as there was such a lot, but you can probably keep some in the fridge for a few days or freeze them. The cat is refusing to eat them and I can’t eat 18 muffins, much as I would like to, so that’s what I’m going to do.

Anyway, to the breakfast idea (“at last,” you say). Easy peasy but actually really nice and filling: 

Pop muffin in bowl, chop up some pineapple (I happened to have some fresh left over in the fridge), pour on a little pineapple juice, spoon some soya yogurt over and demolish. It went down a treat and even Philip liked it. None of yer boring muffins for us! Something about the spicyness of the muffin and the pineapple went really well together. Very decadent. Just needs a little rum….

You can get the mix via www.allergyessex.co.uk. Their website is a little slow unfortunately so I have been looking at the rest of the range on the manufacturer’s site at www.allergygrocer.com. Next up,  I will be trying the tortilla mix. The cat better watch out.