Purple carrot muffins with mascarpone cream

Do you know purple carrots? Completely natural and excellent for circulation. Carrots came from Afghanistan and were originally purple; in 1720 the Dutch bred orange ones in honour of William of Orange, crossing seeds in fields rather than laboratories. This recipe is egg-free.
INGREDIENTS
200 g Manitoba or Italian '00' flour
100 g potato starch
120 g brown sugar
120 g ground almonds
230 g grated carrots
1 sachet baking powder
1 tiny pinch bicarbonate of soda
1 pinch salt
160 g natural yoghurt
80 g seed oil; I used corn
Vanilla flavouring
Milk, including soya, as needed for softness
MASCARPONE CREAM
250 g mascarpone
250 g fresh whipping cream
50 g icing sugar
DECORATION
White sugar paste
Blue, yellow and red food colouring

Purple carrots.

I prepare and finely grind or grate them.

I finely grind almonds.

I sift flour, starch and baking powder.

Then a pinch of salt and bicarbonate.

I mix in brown sugar and almonds.

I combine yoghurt and oil.

I add to dry ingredients.

I add carrots.

I add milk until not too firm.

I divide between paper-lined muffin moulds. I made 16 and bake at 180°C about 25/30 minutes, watching and testing with a skewer; a dry centre means cooked.

Decorate simply with cream: whip cream, mascarpone and icing sugar with an electric whisk and pipe rosettes with a ridged nozzle. I added purple sugar-paste carrots to echo the main ingredient. I soften white sugar paste, available in supermarket packets, and tint with food colours. Work by hand; if very hard, microwave a second.

For purple, gradually combine blue and red into the sugar paste to your preferred shade. Keep coloured paste wrapped until used, or it dries.



For green, add blue and yellow.



I lengthen small purple balls into carrots, flatten and cut green strips and press onto each top, shaping with movement. I mark small cuts on the carrots with a knife.

I pipe cream onto muffins and add a little carrot.