Carrot cake...mmmm yumyumyum
A
couple years ago I was on a quest to find the best carrot cake recipe. I pulled a few
cook books and started to read. Being familiar with scratch cake recipes, I picked three options.
I
baked all three recipes...one right after the other. I numbered the cakes and
recipes and made people vote. I took one-quarter of each cake to each of two
neighbors, one-quarter of each to my favorite mechanic and the last group was
for us. This was voted the Best Carrot Cake recipe. It is moist and cake-like, not dense like a fruit cake as some carrot cakes tend to be.
The
most important ingredient of carrot cake is of course, freshly grated carrots.
Be sure to buy the full sized carrots, not those little nubs of carrots that
are just buzzed down versions of the big guys.
I
know, grating carrots is messy. Trust me, I know! So I buy the five pound bag
and grate a whole bunch at one time. Peel the entire bag and cut off the top
and bottom ends.
My trusty old, as in twenty-five year old JCPenny food processor, is perfect for making quick work of grating 5 pounds of carrots. 
And why on earth do I shred five pounds of carrots at once? Because it is messy and I want to clean up messes as little as possible. And grated carrots freeze well!
I put them in two cup containers by Ziplock and toss them in the freezer. Now I have grated carrots anytime I need to whip up a cake to take to someone.
Now on to the baking! Gather all of your ingredients before you start to bake.
NOTE: there is a missing ingredient in this photo!
Cinnamon is missing.
Be sure to choose a pan too!
HINT: I spray my pan with flour/baking spray before adding the batter.
I have a fun collection of Bundt pans for baking. I have found the rose one shown here is good for a generous portion of cream cheese frosting. Some people think they should skip the cake and just have the frosting. Who am I to disagree?
Finally! On to THE BEST CARROT CAKE RECIPE!
Add ingredients in this order:
1 1/3 Cups vegetable oil
4 Large eggs
2 Cups granulated sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 1/2 Cups flour (divided) add half
1 Cup (1 8oz can) crush pineapple with liquid
add the second half of the flour after the pineapple has been added
Stir these two in by hand:
3/4-1 Cup chopped walnuts
2 Cups shredded carrots
Bake at 340 - 350 degrees until a toothpick comes out clean. Baking times will vary greatly by oven and pan style. HINT: never open the oven door until you smell the cake. It isn't going to be even close until the scent is in the air.
Remove the cake from the baking pan 10 minutes after removing from the oven to prevent sticking to the pan.
Allow the cake to cool, but not all the way. The frosting is going to set better on a slightly warm cake. I know this isn't what your home ec teacher told you. But it works, trust me.
At last! The CREAM CHEESE FROSTING!
Again, gather your ingredients ahead of time. I pull my cold items from the 'fridge when the cakes come out of the oven to give them time to soften.
Hint: real vanilla extract tastes so much better than imitation. Spend the extra for the good stuff.
Blend these in the mixer:
4 oz cream cheese, slightly softened
1/4 Cup butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 pound Confectioner's sugar
milk, enough to smooth the frosting, usually 1-2 tablespoons
Enjoy!
Recipe variations: as you may have noticed, there is a lot of oil in this recipe. I have found that substituting one individual serving of applesauce (3.9 oz container) is ok. It does not change the flavor nor texture of the cake. If you substitute all the oil with applesauce, the texture changes too much to be a traditional carrot cake.
mmmmcarrotkeck!
maggieb!