I LOVE CARROT CAKE.
That’s all I really have to say, I looooove carrot cake. And I think I make a very good one.
This cake is so moist, so soft and the flavour is amazing. If you like carrot cake, you need to try this recipe.
The cake batter
Making this cake batter is super easy to make, you’re essentially just whisking everything together.
These are the ingredients you are going to need:
- Soft dark brown sugar – light brown sugar or granulated sugar does work BUTTT dark brown sugar is going to give you the most moisture and the best flavour.
- Oil – any flavourless oil works but I always use vegetable oil.
- Eggs
- Plain yoghurt – for some extra moisture. Greek yoghurt or even sour cream can be used.
- Vanilla extract
- Plain flour – also known as all purpose flour.
- Baking powder and baking soda
- Spices
- Carrots – use freshly grated ones.
- Walnuts and raisins – OPTIONAL, you don’t need to add them if you don’t want to.Â
The spices
My favourite thing about carrot cake is the spices, I would be upset if I was eating a carrot cake and it had no spices in it.
They just make the cake taste warm…if that makes sense. They make the cake taste very warm.
You can use whatever spices you want, but these are the ones I use:
- Cinnamon
- Ginger
- CardamomÂ
- Nutmeg
But again you can use whatever you want.
The cream cheese frosting
We’re making a cream cheese frosting to go with our cake. It’s super easy to make, all you need is butter, icing sugar (also known as powdered sugar), vanilla extract and cream cheese.
Here are a few tips:
If you have an electric mixer, use it
We’re going to be beating our frosting a lot, to make it light and fluffy.
So if you have an electric hand mixer or stand mixer, this is a good time to use it.
Use softened butterÂ
This is very important.
It will be so difficult to make this frosting if your butter is cold and hard, so make sure it is softened.
You can either leave it out at room temperature for a while, or I just cut the butter into cubes then heat it in my microwave at 10 second intervals, until it’s soft. NOT MELTED, just soft.
Sieve your icing sugar
Icing sugar can be lumpy.
We don’t want a lumpy frosting, we want a smooth frosting, so sieve the sugar before using it.
Use full fat cream cheese
Low fat cream cheese has a higher moisture content.Â
So if you use it, your frosting will be too soft, so use full fat cream cheese.
Decorating the cake
Once the cake layers have baked and cooled, and the cream cheese frosting has been made, you can put the cake together and decorate it.
Decorate your cake however you want, I didn’t do much.
All I did was cover the cake in the frosting and added chopped walnuts so the sides. I wanted to keep it simple.
But once the cake has been decorated, you are done. You can finally dig in.
I make a lot of cakes, here are some other recipes I think you also need to try:
Carrot Cake
Ingredients
- For the cake:
320 g soft dark brown sugar
300 ml vegetable oil
4 eggs
100 g plain yoghurt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
400 g plain flour
1.5 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon cardamom powder
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
350 g grated carrots
100 g walnuts, chopped (optional)
50 g raisins (also optional)
- For the cream cheese frosting:
300 g unsalted butter, softened
300 g icing sugar, sieved
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
600 g full fat cream cheese
- Extras:
Chopped walnuts, to decorate (optional)
Directions
- Making the cake:
- Start by pre-heating your oven to 180c/350f. Also grease and line two 8 inch cake tins.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the sugar, oil, eggs, yoghurt and vanilla.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, cardamom powder and nutmeg. Add this into the wet ingredients and whisk everything together just until you get a smooth batter.
- Now mix in the grated carrots. If you are adding walnuts and raisins, add them at this point too.
- Pour this into your cake tins and bake in your pre-heated oven for around 45-55 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean.
- Once baked, leave them to cool completely.
- Making the cream cheese frosting:
- In a large bowl, add the softened butter, half of the icing sugar and the vanilla. Mix all this together.
- Add the rest of the icing sugar, mix until incorporated, then beat this for 5 minutes.
- Now add the cream cheese and beat until you get a smooth, thick frosting.
- Leave this aside until you're ready to use it.
- Decorating:
- Once the cake layers have completely cooled, you can ice and decorate them.
- Add one of the cake layers down onto a cake board or plate, spread a layer of the frosting over this, then add the second cake layer.
- Now you can decorate the cake however you want. I just covered the cake in the frosting, added a swirl on top, then I covered the sides with some chopped walnuts.
- Cut into it and enjoy!
Tried this recipe yesterday and omg I made the most perfectly moist and delicious cake! I was so happy for my first try. Strongly recommend this recipe!
Tried it about 2 weeks ago and it came out amazing on the first try. I made it without mixing in the walnuts and raisins. The cake was moist and I loved the frosting
Best carrot cake recipe I’ve used, I managed to convert my family of carrot cake haters with this cake.