Carrot Cake Waffles

Hubby and I used to love going to Paradise Cove in Malibu to have breakfast. It was a nice cafe right on the beach and I used to love ordering their Carrot Cake waffles. We've gone there a few times, until hubby got a serious bout of food poisoning from there. So we haven't gone back since. But I really miss eating their Carrot Cake waffles and always wondered when I would get another taste of it.

Yesterday, we went on our weekly trip to Costco and I came across a cookbook that had a recipe for carrot pancakes. "Light bulb!" I didn't buy the cookbook, but I decided to search for it online and came across this recipe from Tasty Kitchen. I haven't used my waffle iron in a long time, so I decided to use it for this recipe.

It came out pretty good, but it wasn't the Paradise Cove waffles I came to love. However, my daughter really liked it. What's even better is that she was actually eating carrots without knowing it. She hates carrots or any other vegetables. So this was another great way to sneak-in something healthy for her. I'll probably attempt another version of this recipe, but I'm definitely making carrot cake waffles again.

1 1/4 cup all purpose flour

2 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp. salt

1/8 tsp. ground nutmeg

1/8 tsp. ground ginger

1/8 tsp. ground cloves

1/4 light brown sugar, lightly packed

3/4 cup buttermilk

1 Tbsp. canola oil

1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

2 eggs

2 cups finely shredded carrots

1/2 cup crushed pineapple

1) Combine flour, salt and all the spices in a large bowl, stirring with a whisk. In a medium bowl, combine brown sugar, buttermilk, oil vanilla extract and eggs. Add sugar mixture into flour mixture and stir just until moist. Fold in shredded carrots and crushed pineapple.

2) Heat waffle iron and coat top and bottom of pan with a nonstick spray or brush with melted butter. Using an ice cream scoop, scoop batter onto waffle iron, close lid and cook until done. Serve warm with maple syrup and/or whipped cream.