Monday Review: Who’d have thunk it? Cake as part of your five a day!

12:01 am

You've all heard of carrot cake but what about a cake chock full of pumpkin, courgette or beetroot? Surprising?  Well you would be even more surprised to learn that's exactly what Petit Pois cakes are producing and they are selling like the proverbial in Selfridge's foodhalls.


In fact Petit Pois cakes contain more vegetables in them than any other ingredient.  They come in four delicious flavours chocolate, lemon, orange and our favorite vanilla. You would be hard pressed however to tell that these are a healthier cupcake though. In particular the chocolate variety (which contains beetroot) is so devilishly gooey you would expect it to go straight to your hips but these cakes contain no butter, very little sugar and best of all half the calories. The cakes come in boxes of two, iced with a little green marzipan pea on top, I defy you to not want to try both at one sitting as they are so lovely and light (this kind of defeats the object though - so go easy!).

Although Petit Pois cakes are some of the first vegetable cakes to be sold commercially, baking with vegetables is not a new idea by any means. During the war at the height of rationing women rose to the challenge of creating their normal everyday favourites out of whatever was available.  Substitution was the norm, whatever was plentiful and off ration at the time was used. People were encouraged to dig for victory and so it wasn’t really any surprise that women turned to substitute fats and sugars for vegetables in baking. But after rationing once sugar and butter was available again people returned to these ingredients and the healthier tastier alternatives were sadly forgotten for a while.  But in 2009 Harry Eastwood began to turn back the clock with her best selling cookbook Red Velvet  & Chocolate Heartache. As the queen of cooking yourself thin it is no surprise to learn that she is actually the brains behind the company together with American entrepreneur Ashley Maddox. 

We thought these cupcakes were fab, a healthy treat that you wouldn't have any problems in getting the kids or in fact anyone to eat.  Lovely with a cuppa or equally as part of an afternoon tea. For once you really can have your cake and eat it.


The gorgeously packaged Petit Pois cakes are available from Selfridges for £5 a box.


We received Petit Pois cakes free of charge to review.



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