What is carob you ask? well if my research serves me correctly it's the fruit / pod from the carob tree which is a species of flowering evergreen shrub or tree in the pea family.

The trees grow in places such as Spain, Italy and Morocco and the pods typically dried or roasted, and mildly sweet. In powdered, chip, or syrup form it is used as an ingredient in cakes and cookies, and is used as a substitute for chocolate.

Carob was eaten in Ancient Egypt. It was also a common sweetener and was used in the hieroglyph for "sweet" (nedjem). Dried carob fruit is traditionally eaten on the Jewish holiday of Tu Bishvat. Carob juice drinks are traditionally drunk during the Islamic month of Ramadan. Also it is believed to be an aphrodisiac.

All above info courtesy of wiki

I want to say this cake was the best thing I've ever eaten because mashaAllah the photos aren't half bad BUT i just didn't like the bitter earthy taste of carob at all, it didn't taste like chocolate then again maybe dark chocolate does taste like that, i don't honestly know but i won't be experimenting with carob again inshaAllah

Good news alhamduillah my kids seem to like this cake and are so easily taken it by it's chocolate appearance.

Anyone own a dog? well carob is a good substitute for chocolate because if you own a dog you know that they aren't supposed to consume chocolate and why? i don't have a clue but some random fact I've obtained over the years growing up always with a dog in the house alhamduillah that is not the case now.

If you do fancy giving this recipe a go after my terrible review, head on over to carob fudge cake it's an egg free cake which is always a plus if you don't have eggs in the kitchen or have allergies and the only changes i made were replacing the butter in the cake for margarine and for the icing i used 100g coconut butter and 20g vegetable shortening, i stayed with cows milk in the cake but i think you could change that for soy, rice, almond etc oh and i added some sugar crystals for decoration.

Sorry for all the negativity around here lately but with every negative experience you learn something new, what you do and don't like and how kids will surprise you and eat the fake chocolate cake to save the calories from your hips and save you from being wasteful alhamduillah