Recipe: Sweet Potato Spice Cake, Gluten-Free, Nut-Free, Dairy-free

As part of the continuing #cook90 Epicurious challenge, and expanding my food world and go-to recipes, I’m continuing to create a new recipe a week and it's MARCH!

So last week, when I bought a 5-pound bag of sweet potatoes at Costco (I shop for a lot of my produce there as I go through so much fruit and veg during the week), I baked up two over the weekend for lunches and dinners, so easy and yum. The next day, when I looked into my fridge, at the cold baked potato and a box of Namaste Spice Mix with one portion of mix left – inspiration struck: Sweet Potato Spice Cake!

Using cold mashed baked sweet potato creates a moist, subtly flavored spice cake (i.e. the sweet potato is not noticeable, like it doesn't taste like a veggie cake, it tastes just YUM!). It’s a cake that would be very happy with a mug of tea for afternoon or tea or after dinner or for breakfast or just whenevs. 

If you want to frost it, an orange glaze would be lovely here: 1 cup confectioners sugar mixed with orange zest and fresh orange juice until desired consistency. Add juice teaspoon by teaspoon. 

And really all I did was add a cup of mashed sweet potato to the recipe on Namaste’s box, just like the carrot cake suggestion. But here it is spelled out.

Recipe: Sweet Potato Spice Cake, Gluten-Free, Nut-Free, Dairy-Free
One 8” square pan cake

Approximately 2.5 cups of dry Namaste Food Spice Cake Mix (or 13-ounces of dry mix)
2 large organic eggs
1/3 c water
1/3 cup Lucini olive oil
1 cup mashed sweet potato (cooled, no skin, no dairy/spices – just the flesh of the potato)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line your pan with parchment paper. Whisk together the water, oil and eggs until incorporated. Add the mashed sweet potato until all is combined. Add the dry mix and mix until combined. Pour into prepared pan and spread out until even.  Bake in oven between 30-35 minutes or until tester comes out clean. Cool and enjoy!