Chocolate, beetroot and orange cake (gluten and dairy-free)
Beetroot, chocolate and orange is a surprisingly delicious combination!
Ingredients
Cake
- 350-400 g beetroot peeled, chopped
- ¼ cup coconut oil or melted butter
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
- 100 g ground almonds
- 100 g desiccated coconut
- 1 orange finely grated zest
- 3½ tablespoons dark cocoa or cacao powder
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 5 free-range eggs
Raspberry mascarpone icing
- 200 g mascarpone
- ½ cup raspberries frozen, defrosted
- 2-3 tablespoons icing sugar
- raspberries and coconut chips to garnish optional
Instructions
- Preheat oven 170degC. Lightly grease and line a 20-23cm round spring-form cake tin with baking paper.
- Boil beetroot until soft (about 15 minutes).
- Drain beetroot and place in food processor along with coconut oil/butter, brown sugar and vanilla essence. Blitz until smooth.
- Add ground almonds, coconut, orange zest, cocoa powder, baking powder and eggs, and continue blitzing until mixture is smooth and well combined. Pour into prepared cake tin and bake for 1 hour or until cake is just set. Leave to cool before removing from tin.
- Allow to cool completely before icing. To make the icing, beat mascarpone with raspberries and icing sugar until well combined, then place in fridge for at least one hour (or in the freezer for about 15 minutes) to firm up before spreading over the cake. Garnish cake with extra raspberries and coconut chips if desired. Alternatively, just dust cake with a bit of dark cocoa powder.
Notes
The beetroot makes the cake incredibly moist and gives it an earthy sweetness that tastes amazing with dark chocolate and a hint of orange.
I’ve topped the cake off with a raspberry mascarpone icing, however If you don’t want to make the icing the cake is just as good dusted with a little cocoa and served with a dollop of coconut yoghurt on the side. Simply delicious!
If you don’t have a food processor, you can whizz the beetroot, coconut oil/butter and eggs in a blender until smooth, then pour into a large mixing bowl and stir in all other ingredients until smooth.
*To make dairy-free – use coconut oil instead of butter and omit mascarpone icing
Check out more delicious chocolate recipes here!