Lisaopolis.comA Nurse's Journey to a Healthy and Balanced Life

Tonight I’m working another night shift. Since I am working nights, I got my usual craving/desire to bake some muffins. I found a recipe in: Company’s Coming Mostly Muffins by Jean Pare, that looked interesting. It is a carrot muffin recipe (on page 43). However the original recipe has no spices, or flavorings in it other then vanilla. Consequently, I changed things up a bit. This is what I came up with. Enjoy.

Carrot Cream Muffins

4 oz cream cheese

¼ cup sour cream

4 tsp granulated sugar

¼ cup finely chopped walnuts

1 ¾ cup all purpose flour

½ cup whole wheat flour

½ cup lightly packed/loose brown sugar

2 tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

¼ tsp nutmeg

2 large eggs

2-3 carrots pealed and cut into small pieces

Sour milk (1 cup skim milk mixed with 1 tsp white vinegar)

3-4 tbsp orange juice

3 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp vanilla extract.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Combine first 4 ingredients in a small bowl. Mix well.

In a large bowl combine the: flours, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Mix well.

In a blender, add the brown sugar, vanilla, sour milk, carrot, orange juice, olive oil and eggs. Blend until smooth.

Add the blender mixture into the dry mixture and stir well.

Spoon into muffin tins.

Add the cream cheese mixture on top (make a well first so that it bakes into the top of the muffin)

Bake until a tooth pick comes out clean when pricked (about 30 minutes).

Enjoy.

This evening I was in the mood to bake so I found a carrot cake recipe and modified it greatly. The original recipe is from allrecipes.com and is called Carrot Cake III. This is my own carrot cake recipe, I only used the other recipe as a guideline.

4 eggs

1 ½ cup white sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp rum extract

½ cup olive oil

2 cups all purpose white four

½ cup brown (whole wheat) flour

2 tsp baking powder

2 tsp baking soda

A few shakes of salt

3 tsp ground cinnamon

1 cup skim milk

2 cups chopped carrots

1 cup chopped pecan pieces

Preheat over to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9X13 pan.

In a bowl combine flour (brown and white), baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and sugar. Mix well. Stir in pecan pieces.

In a blender add the chopped carrots, eggs, milk, vanilla and rum extracts, and oil. Blend until smooth. Add the blended liquid mixture to the dry mixture. Mix until smooth.

Pour the mixture into the pan. Bake for about 40-50 minutes. Test with a tooth pick (when the tooth pick comes out clean the cake is done). Enjoy.

I chose not to make an icing for this cake because I thought it didn’t need it, and I don’t need the extra calories.

This cake tastes very homemade and healthy for a dessert. I give this recipe two thumbs up!

Below is an image of the cake.