When I moved to Denmark 3 years ago I was suddenly exposed to plenty of new things I've never experienced before. The weather was colder, the wind was stronger, the light was less present and there was no proper Polish cottage cheese. Sounds like a disaster, doesn't it? But of course there is more to Denmark than this and one needs time to discover the charm of Denmark. There are all those kind people, with their amazing sense of humor and sane mentality, there is the economic equality, there is the amazingly fresh air (especially if you live on the seaside, which is quite easy to achieve when you're in Denmark) and obviously there is the strongly addictive Danish pastry. The list could go on and on, but somewhere at the top experiences Denmark offered me is carrot cake that I fell in love with from the first bite. I'd eat several portions of it whenever friends brought it to celebrate their birthdays, but whenever I took the challenge of preparing my own carrot cake at home it would end up as a big failure. I've tried a few recipes and all of them gave me a slack-baked cake, but I wouldn't give up. How could I? And today I proudly present my successful recipe for Carrot Muffins!
Carrot Muffins
5 small carrots
20 dates
1 cup apple juice
3 small eggs
3 tsps cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla extract
4 tsps baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
2 cups all-purpose flour
Topping: 4 tbs shredded coconut + 1/2 tsp cinnamon
Put the peeled carrots in food processor and blend them together with dates. Transfer the mass into a bowl and add the remaining ingredients: apple juice, eggs, cinnamon, vanilla extract, baking powder, salt and flour. Use the mixer to homogenize the mass and transfer it to muffin baking pans.
Mix shredded coconut with cinnamon and sprinkle each muffin with the mixture. Transfer muffins to the oven preheated to 190C and bake for 40 minutes or until the coconut shreds become golden and the top part of muffin is crunchy. In the meantime prepare chocolate sauce (optional).
Chocolate sauce
70 g dark chocolate
1/2 cup of water
1/4 cup agave syrup
1/5 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
Pour water into a pot, add agave syrup, cocoa powder and well-chopped dark chocolate. Bring to boil and continue mixing the sauce (the targeted consistency is dense, but still liquid). Allow the sauce to cool before serving and use it for decorating the plate with muffins. An alternative for serving idea instead of chocolate sauce is sour cream (9%). Little tip for serving: muffins taste fantastic served together with black strong tea that will underlie their rich taste.
