It was my son's birthday last week and I decided that a carrot cake would be a good choice. How can you go wrong with a rich, flavorful cake with my favorite frosting...cream cheese. This cake was so good! It had lots of spices and three cups of carrot shreds. It definitely was a carrot cake. The richness of the cake along with it being oh so very moist made me realize I have found the perfect recipe for Carrot Cake.
I decorated it with walnuts and tiny little carrots made out of the cream cheese frosting I was using. The cream cheese frosting spreads so well and it holds its shape when making some embellishments on the cake. I might have overdid the frosting a little, but there were no complaints, so I figure everyone was happy with my choice. Thank you Our Table for Seven for a great recipe.
Ingredients for this cake...
- flour
- sugar
- brown sugar
- cinnamon
- nutmeg
- vegetable oil
- butter
- eggs
- vanilla
- shredded carrots
- walnuts
Ingredients for the frosting...
- butter
- cream cheese
- vanilla
- salt
- powdered sugar
The instructions for this cake were very simple and most of the ingredients you probably already have in your pantry.
Carrot Cake Recipe...
Ingredients:
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 C. granulated sugar
- 1 cup light or dark sugar (firmly packed)
- 1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
- 1 tsp. baking powder
- 1 tsp. salt
- 2 tsps. ground cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
- 1 C. vegetable oil
- 1/2 C. butter melted - it called for unsalted, but I only had salted butter and it was fine
- 4 large eggs (room temperature)
- 1 T. vanilla extract
- 3 C. grated carrots peeled
Ingredients for Cream Cheese Frosting: I doubled this recipe for this cake. The recipe below is for one batch of frosting.
- 1/2 C. (1 stick) butter, softened
- 8 oz. cream cheese (brick style)
- 1 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp. salt
- 4 cups powdered sugar
Instructions:
Cake:
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and line two 8" baking pans with parchment paper, gently greasing and flouring the sides.
- Whisk together the dry ingredients - flour, sugars, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg in a large mixing bowl or a stand mixer.
- Stir in the oil and melted butter; the batter will be stiff and thick at this stage; either mix with a hand mixer or a stand mixer.
- Mix in room temperature eggs (If you forgot to take the eggs out of the refrigerator before you started making the cake, just put the whole eggs in warm water for about 5-7 minutes.) Mix the eggs in the batter one at a time, making sure they are incorporated before you add the next egg.
- Add vanilla extract and mix.
- Stir in the carrots and walnuts by hand by folding them into the batter. Don't overwork the batter.
- Divid the batter equally between both prepared pans and bake for 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
- Allow the cakes to cool in their pans. Use a butter knife to release the cake around the edges. Place both on a wire rack and let cool completely.
Frosting:
- Beat butter until it is creamy and a little lighter in color.
- Sift the powdered sugar to make sure that there are no lumps.
- Add the powdered sugar 1/4 cup at a time. Make sure it is incorporated before you add more sugar.
- Pour in the vanilla extract and salt and keep mixing on medium speed of mixer
- Add cream cheese and beat on medium low until fluffy.
- Add a small amount of cream to make your desired consistency.
- Frost and decorate cooled cake.
For more variations of this cake you can visit Table for Seven here. This cake will be a family favorite for years to come.
One Final Thought...
I love making cakes and cupcakes. I was a cake decorator many, many years ago. I'm always looking for the perfect recipe. This recipe for Carrot Cake is as close to perfect as you can get. I wish I didn't have a sweet tooth, but I do. I never waste my time on processed food or bad ingredients. If you're going to indulge, you should use the best ingredients and the best process. Just never sit down and eat the whole cake yourself...words to live by!😅 Let everyone enjoy your creation...
When I was cake decorating, I would have around 10 cakes waiting around to get picked up for weekends. I actually lost weight while cake decorating because my home always had a scent of vanilla buttercream. After doing it for so many years, I became immune to the scent and the taste. So eating cake wasn't something I would sit down and do. Now that I'm doing it just for fun the scent is back and I love sitting down and having a great piece of cake with what else?...buttercream frosting.
I thought I would add a few more carrot cake and bar ideas. These two recipes are just as delicious as the large Carrot Cake. The first recipe is a Texas Carrot Sheet Pan recipe. It feeds a lot of people. Great for picnics. The Carrot Bars is an old recipe I have that uses strained baby food instead of grated carrots. They are equally as delicious. I also added a few extras. The Karpatka cake is like a giant cream puff. Very simple to make and is quite delicious. The Chocolate Peanut Butter cupcakes are to die for!!!
I love Pinterest! The digital magazine for everything you can think of. The recipes and craft projects are so much fun to look at. Many of my recipes come from Pinterest. I try them and if I think they are really, really good I post them. The above are great for summer because we have access to real summer fruit. The scones above are absolutely delicious!
One Bowl Lemon Brownies
There are so many videos out there to look at. I like to post one video that relates to my post. When I can't figure out a recipe or a craft item, the videos come in so handy.
This recipe is from Jenny Can Cook video library. It's an easy recipe, but the bars are so delicious!.If you are interested in more Jenny Can Cook recipes, just click HERE. She is one of my favorite cooks. Her recipes are easy and she explains everything really well...plus her sense of humor makes me really laugh!
Well that's it for today. I do hope you have a chance to try this Carrot Cake. It is so delicious. Most people is know love Carrot Cake. My children are all grown up and gone now, but when I make a Carrot Cake I share it with all of them. This is my husband's favorite cake...
Always remember..."Life's short...eat dessert first!"...words to live by!
