A Better Carrot Cake
Sprinkle grated carrots with sugar to remove excess moisture and brown the butter!
I love carrot cake, but I do not love its wet, heavy texture. This is caused primarily by the carrots themselves, which contain a great deal of water. My favorite solution is to toss the grated carrots with sugar and let them drain in a colander. I also reduce the amount of carrots from 7 cups in many recipes to just 5 cups. Other testing included adding applesauce (a terrible idea), honey (flavor too strong), whole-wheat flour (made the cake heavy again), cooked carrots (reduced the fresh flavor of carrot), and coconut (dry unsweetened flakes were a nice addition).
Dark brown sugar added depth of flavor. Just under a cup of toasted chopped pecans is also a nice, but optional, addition. Most recipes make a buttercream with cream cheese, sour cream and confectioner’s sugar. I pulled back on the butter to just 3 tablespoons since I am not a buttercream fan (some recipes call for a whole stick or more). I also decided to brown the butter for added flavor. Scroll down to get the recipe!
Kitchen Scraps
What I am Reading: The Art of Fine Baking by Paula Peck
In my recent interview with her on Substack, Dorie Greenspan told me that this is one of her favorite cookbooks, so I bought a copy and agree it’s great. Although it was published in 1961, it is a terrific introduction to and explanation of baking. Cakes, cookies, frosting and fillings, loaf cakes, puff pastry, small dessert cakes, tarts, coffee cakes, and breads are all included. I love that the book is much like attending a cooking school but it is not an 800-page tome. It’s both accessible and useful. How many cookbooks live up to that description 60 years after publication?
Red Lentils for Last Minute Suppers
One of the most useful pantry ingredients are red lentils. They cook in half an hour or less, and there is a simple formula to follow: 1 cup lentils to 6 cups water. Sauté some onion, add tomato paste and spices, add the lentils, water (and small pieces of potato if you like) and cook at a slow simmer for about 25 minutes with the top on. Remove top and finish cooking for a few extra minutes to thicken. Last minute additions include parsley or cilantro, a touch of lemon juice or pomegranate molasses, or you could even serve with shrimp—just let them cook in the soup for 2 or 3 minutes. The lentils are also good served with croutons (tear pieces of rustic bread, toss with olive oil and salt (and a spice or herb as well if you like), and toast in a skillet for about 7 minutes).
Testing The Witt Pizza Oven
I got the opportunity to test the Witt pizza oven with a rotating base. There is one burner under the rotating stone and then a round burner that covers about 270 degrees around the pizza. I got great pizza in about 2 minutes and the rotating stone is a big plus. I have used other smaller propane-fueled pizza ovens and I had to constantly remove the pizza and rotate it to avoid burned edges. One small drawback is lighting the gas burners—you have to keep the knobs depressed for at least 15 seconds to make sure they light properly. But, overall, this is the best pizza oven I have tried to date.
Baking Powder Biscuits with Lard
Leaf lard, the fat around the kidneys in a pig, used to be the fat of choice for pie dough and biscuits. Saturday morning, I went to make my hi-hat biscuits and there was no butter, so I used the leaf lard given to me by Caroline, one of my kids, who renders the fat each fall. The biscuits turned out great—great rise and very tender. It is also the top choice when making pie dough. There is no porky flavor, by the way, which you would get with lard from different parts of the pig. Time to bring back lard as a key ingredient in baking!
Browned Butter Carrot Cake
The nuts and coconut are optional but I recommend both. I prefer the smaller shredded coconut to the larger flakes. You can bake this recipe in either in two 8-inch or 9-inch pans using the same oven temperature—the smaller pan might take a tad more baking time. Be sure to start checking for doneness after 30 minutes. Grating is easiest in a food processor with the grating attachment, but I just use a box grater —note that graters will get dull over time just like a knife. The frosting is a nice take on cream cheese frosting, with just a few tablespoons of butter and sour cream for flavor.
