This vegan gluten free carrot cake is so good no one will ever guess that it’s either vegan or gluten-free! It’s perfectly moist and packed with flavor.
One of the most popular recipes on this blog is our vegan carrot cake.
But it’s not gluten-free. Many have tried it using gluten-free flour and had success, but I wanted to do a version that is designed as gluten-free so that it’s as delicious as it can possibly be and this is it!
No one would ever know that this cake is either vegan or gluten-free never mind both!
It is perfectly moist with all that delicious signature carrot cake spiciness and texture.
How to make vegan gluten free carrot cake
Add gluten free all purpose flour to a mixing bowl along with brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg and mix together.
Then add in grated carrot, flax eggs (ground flaxseed meal mixed with hot water), applesauce, oil, vanilla, apple cider vinegar and chopped walnuts and mix into a thick batter.
Divide between two 8-inch (you can also use 9-inch) prepared cake pans and bake for 30-35 minutes.
Pro tips for Gluten Free Carrot Cake
Use a gluten-free all purpose flour blend. This is super important, this recipe has been designed around using a blend, not a single type of flour like almond flour or rice flour. So it’s important that you use a blend as well. If you use a single type of flour then I can’t be sure at all if it will work out.
Weigh ingredients like flour and grated carrots. This is going to give you the best chance of accuracy in this recipe. If you don’t have a food scale, I highly recommend one. They are really a baker’s best friend in the kitchen.
You can use any vegetable oil but my favorite in this cake was extra virgin olive oil. I also tested it with canola oil and coconut oil. Both of those also work great but coconut oil makes it harder to stir in since this is a very thick batter.
Be patient when mixing this batter. You might think I’ve forgotten an ingredient when you see how thick the batter is, but just leave the bowl for a minute, and let those carrots release extra moisture into the batter and then come back and stir again and suddenly it will turn into a batter.
The walnuts are optional. I think chopped walnuts add something wonderful here and we decorated the cake with chopped pecans but if you’re nut-free you can leave them out with no issues.
You can make it in either 8-inch or 9-inch pans. We tested it in both sizes and it works great for both. What you see pictured here is 8-inch cake layers, but as you can see the layers are nice and fat, so it does adapt to 9-inch cake pans as well, you just have slightly thinner layers, but it still totally works.
There are several frosting options that would work great for this cake. We used the vegan lemon buttercream frosting from our vegan lemon cake to frost this. And that flavor blend really works.
You can also use our vegan buttercream frosting recipe or our vegan cream cheese frosting.
You will love this delicious vegan gluten-free carrot cake! It is:
- Undetectably gluten-free (or vegan!)
- Perfectly moist
- Packed with flavor
- Sooo delicious!
It stays fresh for a couple of days at room temperature, and around 5 days covered in the fridge. It is also freezer friendly so if you want to freeze it, go right ahead.
More Vegan Cakes….
- Vegan Banana Cake
- Vegan Vanilla Cake
- Best Vegan Chocolate Cake
- Vegan Apple Cake
- Vegan Red Velvet Cake
- Vegan Pound Cake
So let us know what you think of this vegan gluten-free carrot cake in the comments and please rate the recipe too! Thanks!
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Vegan Gluten Free Carrot Cake
Ingredients
For the Carrot Cake:
- 3 cups Gluten Free All Purpose Flour Blend (408g)
- 2 cups Light Brown Sugar (400g)
- 1 and ½ tsp Baking Soda
- 1 and ½ tsp Baking Powder
- ¾ tsp Salt
- 1 Tbsp Ground Cinnamon
- 1 and ½ tsp Ground Nutmeg
- 2 Flax Eggs 2 Tbsp Ground Flaxseed Meal with 6 Tbsp Hot Water
- 3 Tbsp Applesauce
- 3 and ⅓ cups Grated Carrot (366g)
- ¾ cup Canola Oil (180ml) or Vegetable Oil
- 2 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1 and ½ Tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
- 1 and ½ cups Walnuts (150g) Chopped, Optional
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Spray two 8-inch* cake pans with non-stick spray and line the bottoms with parchment paper.
- Sift the flour into a mixing bowl and add the brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg and mix together.
- Prepare your flax eggs by adding 2 Tbsp ground flaxseed meal to a bowl and then adding 6 Tbsp of hot water from the kettle. Leave it to sit for a minute to become gloopy.
- Add the flax eggs, applesauce, grated carrot, oil, vanilla extract, apple cider vinegar and chopped walnuts and mix into a thick batter. If it's struggling to come together, just leave the bowl to sit for a couple of minutes and then come back and stir again and it should come together. Leaving it for a minute will allow the grated carrots to release more moisture into the bowl allowing it all to come together.
- Divide the batter evenly between the prepared cake tins. Place into the oven and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out mostly clean. If you have some crumbs on the toothpick, this is fine, but you don't want wet batter.
- Let them cool for 5 minutes or so and then remove them from the cake pans and place them onto a wire cooling rack and allow to cool completely before frosting.
- Frost with any of the choices of frostings above and decorate with chopped nuts (we used pecans).
Notes
- It's very important that you use a gluten-free all purpose flour blend that is intended to replace wheat flours in baking. I have used various brands and all have worked great, the important thing is that it must be a blend.
- Weighing ingredients like your flour and grated carrots is going to give you the best chance of a perfect result.
- The frosting we used in these photos is the vegan lemon frosting.
- This cake can also be made in 9-inch cake pans. Everything else remains exactly the same, the layers will just be slightly thinner than what you see pictured here. We have tested this as 9-inch and it's perfect.
- Nutritional information is for cake only and does not include frosting.
- Recipe adapted from our recipe for Vegan Carrot Cake.
I used Bob’s Red Mill 1-1 baking blend. Cake turned out great everyone enjoyed it. Was a bit heavier than regular carrot cakes I have made in the past, so when I make it again I will do thinner layers using 3 8 inch pans instead of the 2. Paired it with the suggested vegan cream cheese frosting which I flavored with lemon and it was perfect.
Wonderful! Thanks so much for sharing Ann!
Made this twice and each time the cake stuck to the pan, and had to cook for double the time as even then the cake wasn’t cooked. I’m pretty sure I followed each step not sure where I went wrong 🙁
Hi V, definitely always use parchment paper circles at the bottoms of your pans and also spray well with non-stick spray. Taking too long to cook though sounds like an oven temp issue. We use an oven thermometer and it is SO helpful.
Hi Alison, it sounds delicious, can I use palm sugar instead of brown sugar?
Yes that should work great! 🙂
Unsweetened or regular applesauce?
Either/or is fine here.
Can I use regular all purpose flour that is not gluten free?
Yes you can!
Dear Alison, loved the recipe but could you tell me which gf flour blend do you use as I always have trouble finding a good blend thanks
I really like Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free Baking Flour. 🙂