Instant Pot Carrot Snack Cake #BakingBloggers

Delightfully rich and full of sweet carrot flavor, this sticky carrot snack cake is baked in an Instant Pot - keeping your kitchen cool during the summer - and then spread with lemony cream cheese frosting.

When it’s too hot outside to turn your oven on, an Instant Pot comes in mighty handy, even for baking cake. This carrot snack cake bakes up lovely, light and tender. If you have a sweet tooth, you can top it with cream cheese frosting (recipe below) or sprinkle with some powdered sugar, but it’s also great just on its own.

This month my Baking Blogger group is challenging the notion that everything must be baked in a full size oven by using small appliances instead. Despite owning the Instant Pot since the summer of 2016, I really hadn’t tested its baking abilities. For a one-layer snack cake, I may never turn the oven on again!

If you don’t have an Instant Pot yet, I recommend you wait for Prime Day on July 16th to buy one on Amazon. There are always deals on Instant Pots! The one I have is 6 in 1, in other words, it has six functions. On newer pots you can get up to 10 functions!

I’ve adapted the carrot snack cake batter from my family’s favorite carrot cake recipe, known around these parts as David’s Carrot Cake. But for Instant Pot baking instructions, I looked to my friend Kathy Hester’s great Instant Pot cookbook.

If you haven’t met Kathy, you need to head on over to her blog for a tour. Her recipes are all vegan but don’t let that scare you off. Everything I’ve ever made of hers has been delicious, from her easy avocado lemon pesto to her chickpea vegetable soup, but my all time favorite is her mushroom ginger congee, made not with the traditional rice, but oats! Both my husband and I licked our bowls clean of that gorgeous dish and moaned when the pot was empty.

Instant Pot Carrot Snack Cake

The Instant Pot doesn’t make baking this carrot snack cake any faster than the traditional oven method. The advantage is keeping your kitchen cool in the summer and still getting to enjoy a tasty cake! If you live somewhere hot, trust me, that is a really big deal.

Ingredients
For the cake batter:
8 oz or 225g carrots
1 cup or 125g flour
2/3 cup or 133g sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg, at room temperature
1/2 cup or 120ml canola or another light cooking oil, plus a little extra for the pan

For the cream cheese frosting:
1 cup or 125g powdered sugar
4 oz or 113g cream cheese, at room temperature
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

To decorate and add lemon flavor:
Zest 1 lemon

Method
Peel and cut the ends off of your carrots and cut them into short lengths.

Cover them with water in a medium sized pot and cook until very fork tender, about 10-15 minutes. Drain the water off and mash them with a potato masher until there aren’t any lumps. Set aside to cool.

Prepare your 8 in or 20cm round cake pan by greasing it with a little oil.  In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

Prepare your Instant Pot by adding 1 1/2 cups of water to the pot. Put the wire rack inside the pot. Fold a long length of foil to create a two-sided handle that will go under your baking pan, enabling you to remove it from the Instant Pot when the cake is done.

When the carrots are cool, add in the egg and oil and whisk till they are well combined.

Pour the wet ingredients into the bowl with the dry ingredients. Stir gently until they are well mixed and no dry flour is showing.

Spoon the batter into the prepared pan and even out the top with knife.

Cover the pan with foil, making sure to keep it flat against the sides so the pan will still fit in the Instant Pot.

Using the folded foil handle, lower the covered pan carefully into the Instant Pot, all the way down till it is sitting on the wire rack. Follow the manufacturer’s instructions to set it to cook for 35 minutes, with the steam release sealed.

When the cooking time is up, leave the Instant Pot to depressurize naturally. The Instant Pot automatically goes into Keep Warm mode, so I thought it would be necessary to turn that off. In fact, it doesn’t make any difference if you do or don’t.  It will depressurize regardless. Mine took about 30 minutes.

When it’s safe to take the lid off, do so and carefully remove it. Use the foil handles to take the cake pan out of the Instant pot, remove the foil lid and set the carrot snack cake on a wire rack to cool for about 10 minutes.

Turn the cake out of the pan and leave to cool completely on the wire rack.

Meanwhile, make the cream cheese frosting by mixing all of the ingredients together until they are smooth and all the lumps are gone. I start with a fork then end with a spatula.

When the cake has cooled completely, top it with the cream cheese frosting and spread it out to the edges of the cake.

Sprinkle on the lemon zest.

Cut into wedges to serve. Enjoy!

Because of the cream cheese frosting, it's best to refrigerate any leftovers. I popped my clean cake pan over the top of mine to keep it from drying out in the fridge. You can cover the cake with cling film but know that the cream cheese frosting is going to stick to it.

Many thanks to Wendy of A Day in the Life on the Farm for handling all the behind the scenes work this month. Check out the other small appliances bakes we have for you today!

• Air Fryer Cheesy Vegetable Tart from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Crockpot Sour Cream Pound Cake from Our Good Life 
• Hot Chocolate Pudding Cake from Sid's Sea Palm Cooking 
• Instant Pot Carrot Snack Cake from Food Lust People Love 
• Jam Cheesecake from A Day in the Life on the Farm 
• Slow Cooker Reeses Cake from Cookaholic Wife 
• Strawberry Sandwich Toaster Cake from Sneha's Recipe 

Baking Bloggers is a friendly group of food bloggers who vote on a shared theme and then post recipes to fit that theme one the second Monday of each month. If you are a food blogger interesting in joining in, inquire at our Baking Bloggers Facebook group. We'd be honored if you would join us in our baking adventures.

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Sweet Peach Cream Cheese Muffins #MuffinMonday

Sweet Peach Cream Cheese Muffins celebrate the best of summer peaches with a wonderfully subtle tang. They are perfect for a summertime brunch, breakfast or snack.

If you follow me on Instagram, you know I’ve been flitting all about this last week and a half, with a long weekend first in New York City and then a few short days in Quito, Ecuador. Now I am finally back in my hometown of Houston, enjoying time with even more family and taking advantage of local Texas produce, like my favorite crookneck yellow squash, young carrots with greens still attached, glowing golden beets, and especially the fragrant peaches.

In the Dubai grocery stores, peaches rarely smell like peach. They’ve been picked too young and flown in from goodness knows where. The Texas peaches actually smell as a good peach should. I stood in front of the peach bin picking many of them up, one by one, inhaling that glorious aroma and tucking them into a produce bag.

When I got home, my mom reminded me that peaches are her favorite fruit, to which I replied, I know! That’s why I’m making peach cream cheese muffins. I love cooking and baking for Mom because she always loves whatever I make.

Which brings me to this month’s Muffin Monday recipe.

Sweet Peach Cream Cheese Muffins

If you don’t have good fresh peaches, you can substitute frozen or, if you drain them well on some paper towels first, peaches canned in natural juice.

Ingredients
2 ripe but firm peaches (approximate whole weight of both: 10.5 oz or 300g)
2 cups or 250g flour
1 cup or 200g sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 oz or 113g cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup or 60g butter, melted and cooled, plus extra for the pan
1 large egg, at room temperature
3/4 cup or 180ml milk

Method
Preheat oven to 350°F or 180°C. Prepare your muffin pan by buttering it or lining it with muffin cups.

Pit and dice your peaches, setting aside about 1/4 cup to top the muffins with before baking. The larger pile will go in the muffin batter.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together your flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt.

Tip in the bigger pile of diced peaches and stir till the peach bits are well coated with the flour. Set aside.

In a medium bowl, mash the cream cheese with a fork, then pour in the cool, melted butter. Use the fork to mix the cream cheese and butter together until you have a mixture that looks like small soft curds.

Add in the egg and the milk and beat with the fork until combined. There will still be some tiny lumps of cream cheese.

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and fold until they are just combined.

Divide the batter between the muffin cups in your prepared pan. Top with the reserved diced peach.

Bake in your preheated oven for 20-25 minutes or until the muffins are golden all around the edges and a toothpick comes out clean.

Cool in the pan for about 10 minutes, then remove the muffins and cool on a wire rack. These can be served warm or room temperature.

Enjoy!

Check out the other lovely muffins my Muffin Monday friends are sharing today!

• Cheesy Corn Muffins from A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Chile and Raspberry Muffins from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Oreo Muffins from Passion Kneaded
• Strawberry Banana Muffins from Farm Fresh Feasts
• Sweet Peach Cream Cheese Muffins from Food Lust People Love

#MuffinMonday is a group of muffin loving bakers who get together once a month to bake muffins. You can see all our of lovely muffins by following our Pinterest board. Updated links for all of our past events and more information about Muffin Monday, can be found on our home page.

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Inside Out German Chocolate Cake #BundtBakers

Instead of being topped with the traditional icing, for this inside out German chocolate cake a super chocolaty batter is baked in a Bundt pan filled knee deep in coconut and pecans, with dollops of sweetened buttery cream cheese. When you turn it over, the coconut and pecans create a lovely top and the cream cheese lines the bottom.

That said, once I had it turned out, it seemed a little naked, so I brushed the outside with condensed milk and sprinkled on a bit more flaked coconut and chopped pecans. But you don’t need to.

Growing up, German chocolate was often my birthday cake of choice. I loved the chocolate cake, the pecans, the coconut! Absolutely everything about it. But it wasn't until recently that I began to research the origins of the name and recipe.

You all probably knew this, but it turns out that German chocolate cake is wholly American. The "German" in the title is from the surname of the gentleman, one Samuel German, who created the original bakers' chocolate (way back in 1852) that was used in a chocolate cake recipe that was printed in the Dallas Morning News in 1957, more than a century later. Ever since Mrs. George Clay's original recipe was the Recipe of the Day, bakers have been replicating it and adapting it, but they've never stopped baking it.

Two of the variations are upside down German chocolate cake and inside out German chocolate cake, and a Google search turned up an astonishing number of recipes for each. This one, despite its name, is a sort of combination of both.

Inside Out German Chocolate Cake

Fudgy chocolate cake with a crunchy curve of pecans and coconut on top, plus a chewy caramelized bottom, this Bundt has got a whole lot going on. All of it delicious.

Ingredients
1 cup, lightly packed, or 145g sweetened coconut flakes
1 1/2 cups or 200g pecans, chopped
1 1/2 cups or 190g all-purpose or plain flour
1 1/2 cups or 300g white granulated sugar
1/2 cup or 40g unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup or 180ml buttermilk
1/3 cup or 80ml vegetable oil
1 large egg
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
3/4 cup or 180ml boiling water
2 teaspoons instant coffee powder
4 oz or  113g cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup or 57g butter, softened
1 3/4 cups or 226g powdered sugar

Optional extras for decorating:
condensed milk
sweetened coconut flakes
chopped pecans

Method
Preheat oven to 350°F or 180°C.  Liberally grease and flour a 12-cup Bundt pan.

Mix the coconut flakes and chopped pecans together then spoon them into the bottom of the Bundt pan. Use your clean hands or the back of a spoon to create a channel all the way around, pressing the coconut and chopped pecans up the sides of the pan. Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt.

Add the oil, egg, vanilla and buttermilk to the flour mixture and beat well to combine. Dissolve the coffee in the boiling water then pour it into the bowl. Beat until fully incorporated and glossy.

Pour the cake batter into the channel of the coconut and pecans. Keep pouring until all the batter is in the Bundt pan.

Using an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese, butter and powdered sugar in medium bowl until well blended.

Spoon the cream cheese mixture onto the cake batter - Do NOT mix it in.

Bake on middle rack in oven for 45-50 minutes. The cream cheese mixture will initially sink, then it will start bubbling up and browning.

The cake is done when a skewer comes out of the cake with no more than light crumbs sticking to it.

Remove the Bundt pan from the oven and set to cool on a rack for no more than 10 minutes. Use your skewer to loosen the sticky bits from the edges of the pan, then turn your Inside Out German Chocolate Bundt over onto a parchment lined cutting board. Set aside to cool completely.

Once it’s cooled, you can brush it with condensed milk and sprinkle on some more coconut and chopped pecans, if desired.

Enjoy!

This month our Bundt Baker host is Sue from Palatable Pastime and, as you might have guessed from the list below, our theme/ingredient is chocolate! Check out all the chocolatey cakes we have for you today!

• Alcohol Chocolate Fruit Mini Bundts from Sneha's Recipe
• White Chocolate Bundt Cake from Merce’s Cake
• Caramel Mocha Bundt Cake from All That's Left Are The Crumbs
• Chocolate Brownie Bundt from Cookaholic Wife
• Chocolate Coconut Bundt Cake from Tartacadabra
• Chocolate Oreo Bundt from Living the Gourmet
• Chocolate Tres Leches Bundt Cake from Patty's Cake
• Extra Dark Chocolate and Moka Bundt Cake from Pat y Co. Candy Bar
• Inside Out German Chocolate Cake from Food Lust People Love
• Low Sugar Chocolate Peanut Butter Bundt Cake from Palatable Pastime
• Martha Stewart Chocolate Bundt Cake from I Love Bundt Cakes
• White Chocolate, Almond and Strawberry Curd Bundt Cake from Nunca es Demasiado Dulce

#BundtBakers is a group of Bundt loving bakers who get together once a month to bake Bundts with a common ingredient or theme. Follow our Pinterest board right here. Links are also updated each month on the BundtBakers home page.

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Grilled Pineapple Shrimp Salad #FishFridayFoodies

More than just the sum of its simple parts, this beautiful grilled pineapple shrimp salad will impress your friends and family with its looks and flavor.

Years ago when we lived in Brazil, the churrascaria near our house would serve grilled pineapple as a dessert option. No cinnamon or other seasonings, just pineapple with the natural caramelization that comes from the application of heat to sugar. It makes the pineapple taste sweeter.

Which made me think. Surely I could create the same effect with my grill pan. (It’s already way too hot to light the barbecue pit here in Dubai!) I am pleased to report it works! And grilled pineapple is the perfect base for a small salad topped with shrimp.

This month my Fish Friday Foodies friends are sharing salads with seafood so make sure to scroll down to check out the rest.

Grilled Pineapple Shrimp Salad

Pretty and tasty, perfect for your next dinner party. I use fresh pineapple here, even leaving in the core because it is usually tender enough to eat. If you must substitute canned pineapple, choose the unsweetened ones in plain juice.

Ingredients - to serve 4 as an appetizer or first course
For the salad:
4 slices fresh pineapple
Small handful cilantro
4-5 leaves baby cos lettuce
1 cucumber
1 small red chili pepper
4 jumbo shrimp, cooked and peeled - I leave just the tail on because it's pretty
Freshly ground black pepper

For the dressing:
1 tablespoon minced onion
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1 teaspoon honey
1 tablespoon olive oil
pinch salt

Method
Heat your grill pan over a high heat then grill the pineapple slices for just a few minutes on each side, until you have created charred lines where the natural sugars have caramelized. Remove to a plate and leave to cool.

Chop the cilantro and set aside a few leaves for garnish. Quarter the cucumber lengthwise and remove the seeds. Cut the cucumbers in little cubes. Chop the lettuce roughly  into small pieces. Slice the chili pepper.

Make the salad dressing by whisking all of the ingredients together in small bowl.

Put the cucumber, lettuce and cilantro (saving a sprig or two for garnish) into a small bowl and spoon over three quarters of the dressing. Toss lightly.

Divide the salad into four and place one pile on top of each of the cooled pineapple slices.

Top with the sliced chili pepper and shrimp. Garnish with the reserved cilantro. Drizzle over the last of the dressing on top of the shrimp.

Finish with a sprinkle of freshly ground black pepper.

Enjoy!

If you are a food blogger and would you like to join Fish Friday Foodies, please email Wendy at wendyklik1517 at gmail.com. We post and share new seafood/fish recipes on the third Friday of the month.  Visit our Facebook page and Pinterest page for more wonderful fish and seafood recipe ideas.

Many thanks to Sid from Sid's Sea Palm Cooking for this month's great Fish Fridays Foodies theme. Check out all the wonderful salads with seafood we are sharing!

An InLinkz Link-up

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