{"id":23848,"date":"2018-08-20T11:49:25","date_gmt":"2018-08-20T16:49:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cupcakeproject.com\/?p=23848"},"modified":"2020-01-02T06:58:32","modified_gmt":"2020-01-02T12:58:32","slug":"carob-cupcakes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cupcakeproject.com\/carob-cupcakes\/","title":{"rendered":"Carob Cupcakes"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Carob<\/a><\/p>\n

In this post, contributor Jessica Touchette shares her fabulous carob cupcake recipe with us. I had the pleasure of trying the cupcakes and I immediately fell in love with their sweet, earthy flavor. Plus, the tahini buttercream paired so perfectly with them. Enjoy!<\/p>\n

\n

Carob Cupcakes <\/strong><\/h2>\n

\"Carob<\/a><\/p>\n

Years ago, carob<\/a><\/strong> and I got off to a rocky start. One day, I was greeted home from elementary school by the aroma of warm oatmeal, sugar, and toasted walnuts. Plunking down my backpack and kicking off my shoes, I followed my nose to the rack of cookies cooling on the kitchen island. I inspected the dark add-ins suspiciously.<\/p>\n

\"Carob<\/a><\/p>\n

Were those raisins? No – chocolate chips! Hallelujah. My mom gave me the okay to have one, cautioning me that they might still be a bit warm, and I wasted no time in choosing the biggest cookie I could find. I bit into it, eagerly anticipating the warm, gooey chocolate soon to be melting on my tongue.<\/p>\n

But then: crunch<\/em>. Something was terribly wrong! The chips were rock hard and tasted of some foreign substance, chalky, slightly bitter, and cloyingly sweet. These were no chocolate chips, but some foul imposter! Mum explained that what I tasted was something called “carob,” and that it was “good for me.” I finished my cookie in disappointment, and (sorry, Mum) gave away my lunchbox cookies for the rest of the week.<\/p>\n

Thereafter, carob chips entered my mom’s regular cookie rotation. For her, they represented yet another way in which she could sneak extra nutrition into our food. For my brothers and me, they were nothing short of a detestable lie invented to taunt our tender palates.<\/p>\n

\"Carob<\/a><\/p>\n

I’m not alone in this fraught early introduction to carob. According to New York Times<\/em> reporter Jonathan Kauffman, ours was a generation “traumatized by carob<\/a>,” the virtuously low-fat, stimulant-free chocolate substitute that took the seventies health food scene by storm. Carob had been enjoyed by Mediterranean cultures for thousands of years, served in its own right (with no reference to chocolate) in sweetened drinks, syrups, molasses, candies, and snacks. In America, it was shunted into the narrow role of substitute for a food for which there is no substitute. Is it any wonder that so many of us learned to view carob with suspicion?<\/p>\n

When Stef asked me to come up with a carob recipe, I was forced to give the long-loathed food another chance. To my surprise, I fell in love with its deep, rich flavor. I’ve been throwing carob into smoothies, hummus, zucchini breads, and oatmeal, and enjoy sipping a carob “latte” in the evening. It still tastes nothing like chocolate – but honestly, why did we ever expect it to in the first place? Carob has its own unique flavor, and you can love it or hate it. First, though, let’s lift it out of chocolate’s shadow and try to understand it for what it is<\/em> rather than what it’s not.<\/p>\n

What is Carob?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Carob comes from the carob tree (Ceratonia siliqua<\/em>), a flowering evergreen native to the Mediterranean. We eat the tree’s fruit, a large legume that is generally dried and processed before it is eaten. Carob powder and chips are made from the bean’s dried outer pod, and a variety of thickening and filling agents are made from gum in the seeds.<\/p>\n

\"Carob<\/a><\/p>\n

Carob molasses<\/a><\/strong> is made by crushing and boiling whole carob pods, straining them out, and reducing the resulting liquid. Carob syrup is made in much the same way, but the decoction is sweetened with sugar or honey. The bean can also be eaten straight, though this is definitely not the tastiest option. The dried pod is hard, fibrous, and is often compared to cardboard.<\/p>\n

Is Carob Good For You?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

In the U.S., carob is marketed as (a.) an alternative to chocolate and (b.) a health food.<\/p>\n

The first label is a bit suspect. Carob and cacao both grow on trees and are brown in color, but they have little else in common. Carob can be made to look just like cacao, but it will never taste the same. (To read more about how the two compare, check out the post How is Carob Different from Chocolate<\/a><\/strong>?.)<\/p>\n

Carob is, however, a fairly nutritious food. Unsweetened carob powder is a source of:<\/p>\n