Carrot Sandwiches

Mummy cut the crusts off

I'm sure the novelty is going to wear off soon, but it's very exciting being able to make tiny sandwiches for my son, who now has the required hardware to eat them. It's so much easier to pack a sandwich for our outings, or even lunch at home, than wondering where to warm up a puree.

What to put in the sandwiches is a conundrum though. Peanut butter, cheese and Vegemite all have quite a lot of salt in them, jam and Nutella have too much sugar. Avocado is expensive and doesn't keep well. So here are Carrot Sandwiches (or more specifically, a creamy carrot and ricotta dip that you can put on sandwiches).

Carrot and Ricotta Dip


3-4 small carrots
¼ cup fresh orange juice
¼ tsp minced ginger
2 tbsp ricotta cheese

Simmer the carrots, ginger and orange juice in a small saucepan over medium-low heat until the carrots are very tender. Allow to cool, then add ricotta cheese and blend to make a smooth puree. Serve with vegetables and crackers for dipping, or as a sandwich filling.

Chinese Root Vegetable Cake and Week of the Carrot

Due to some poor ordering over the last two weeks, I have an overabundance of carrots in my fridge. They're delicious sweet little carrots, so I don't want them to go to waste. My challenge this week is to try and cook as many meals as possible that use some carrot, preferably in new and interesting ways!

Grilled Vegetable Cake

For no reason this morning the words "turnip cake" popped into my head and I had no idea what they even meant. Some googling reminded me of a tasty Chinese dim sum made from grated and steamed daikon radish. I've been reading a lot of japanese cooking blogs this week, so maybe my subconscious mind came up with the idea while I was asleep last night. Such is the nature of inspiration!

I don't have any daikon, so here's a very unorthodox version using up the root vegetables in the fridge - a turnip from 500m², part of a large parsnip, a pink radish and a couple of small carrots. The pink radish was grated almost to a paste on the microplane, and the rest very finely grated on the box grater. Then some finely diced Chinese sausage, green spring onions and chopped dried shittake mushrooms (rehydrated) were added. The last step was some rice, tapioca and potato flours (you could use plain rice flour, but I had only a little bit so I had to improvise) mixed with water (including the mushroom soaking water) and a pinch of salt and white pepper to bind it all together. Then into the pressure cooker to steam for 20 minutes. Don't ask me for measurements, I don't know, but my guess is that there was 250ml water and about ¾ cup of flours. Initially I was going to cook this in a small rectangular baking dish, but it *just* didn't fit the pressure cooker, so it ended up in a Pyrex bowl - it was thicker than I would have liked, so I just added 5 minutes to the cooking time.

I lose the challenge because of a dirty plate.
This is the finished cake.

It's very nice if you slice it and grill it in a non-stick frying pan until it's crispy on the outside, then served with a splash of soy or chilli sauce. Oh, and it's vegan if you leave out the sausage!

Mini Carrot Cake Loaves with Caramelised Pineapple

I remember reading about a certain Banana bread company that faced collapse when Cyclone Larry wiped out the banana crop a few years back. What do you do when your core business relies entirely on a foodstuff that has just tripled in price? They invented Pear and Raspberry Bread! It's a reminder not to get too set in your ways when cooking - it's easy to keep making the same thing over and over.

I've dragged out the old brown Margaret Fulton cookbook. It has some fantastic cake recipes, but there are three that are family favourites: Carrot and Pineapple Health Cake (so-called because it has oil instead of butter!), Banana Cake and Spiced Pumpkin Cake. Flicking through the book, there are plenty of other lovely recipes, so I'm going to try some new ones over the next few months. Carrot cake, though, is great to make in winter when carrots are so sweet and tasty. I also have a beautiful hybrid sweet pineapple. I decided use this rather than using the tinned pineapple in the recipe. 

Pretty Pineapple!

I thought I'd share my method for trimming a pineapple. I remember watching a japanese chef do this at a restaurant one night - it was a revelation! The problem with trimming a pineapple is how to get the "eyes" out without cutting so deeply into the pineapple that you lose all the flesh. The best bits, after all, are just underneath the skin. Cut the top  and bottom off the pineapple and cut off the skin, but don't cut too deeply - just enough to expose the flesh. Now look at the eyes - they spiral around the pineapple. Get a small sharp knife and make little v-shaped cuts to remove the eyes, moving around and down the pineapple. You're only just cutting enough flesh to remove the eyes, and making a pretty pattern at the same time! Then you can slice the pineapple as you need it. Another technique is to use a small melon baller to remove the eyes - a safer method if you're not great with your knife skills (perhaps a job for the kids!)

Caramelised Pineapple:
so much better than tinned in syrup!

For this recipe I removed the core of the pineapple, finely diced it, then caramelised it with some coconut palm sugar. This is a sustainable alternative to regular palm sugar, and it tastes like a cross between palm sugar and brown sugar. I also caramelised some thin slices for the top of the cake. The cake also contains pecans and sultanas. To finish, I made a light cream cheese frosting which was a bit rushed and dodgy but did the job.

PS - I've finally realised why hybrid pineapples (such as Bethonga) are sold without their leaves. It's so the growers can protect the variety. This makes perfect sense when you think about it, but I'd never thought about it.