Cake 6: Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

I do this all the time.  I invite people over for dinner and later realize I don’t have time to get to the store—so I end up scrambling trying to figure out what to fix with ingredients I already have on hand.  Fortunately, I generally manage to pull it off okay.  Case in point: this delicious carrot cake from Mel’s Kitchen Café.  (I know, I could probably be her one woman advertising team.)

Made from staple ingredients, this cake is awesome.  One note: make sure you cool this baby COMPLETELY before attempting to frost it.  I was a bit hasty in putting this together and even though it was cooked completely, both layers sank in the middle, leaving a pretty good sized crater.  Yay for lots of frosting and home-canned apricot preserves to make it look like I MEANT to have a hollow cake.

Carrot Cake and Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:
2 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (12 1/2 ounces)
1 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 lb. medium carrots (6 to 7 large carrots), peeled
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar (10 1/2 ounces)
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar (3 1/2 ounces)
4 large eggs
1 1/2 cups vegetable or canola oil

Frosting

Note: You might want to double the frosting recipe if making for a layer cake—I didn’t, but kind of wish I had…

8 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temperature
5 tablespoons butter softened to room temperature
1 tablespoon sour cream, light or regular
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups powdered sugar (4 1/2 ounces)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Adjust oven rack to middle position. Grease and flour a 9X13-inch baking pan or 2 9-inch round pans.

Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and salt in large bowl; set aside. In a food processor fitted with large or fine shredding disk, shred carrots (you should have about 3 cups); transfer carrots to bowl and set aside. You can also shred by hand on a box grater if you don’t have a food processor. (I use a salad shooter—remember those?)

In a large bowl and using hand-held mixer, beat granulated and brown sugars and eggs on medium-high until thoroughly combined, about 45 seconds. Reduce speed to medium; with mixer running, add oil in slow, steady stream, being careful to pour oil against inside of bowl (if oil begins to splatter, reduce speed to low until oil is incorporated, then resume adding oil). Increase speed to high and mix until mixture is light in color and well emulsified, about 45 seconds to 1 minute longer. Turn off mixer and stir in carrots and dry ingredients by hand until incorporated and no streaks of flour remain.

Pour into prepared pan(s) and bake until toothpick or skewer inserted into center of cake comes out clean, about 32 minutes for 9-inch round pans and 40 minutes for a 9X13-inch pan. Let cakes cool for about 10 minutes in the pan and then invert them onto a cooling rack to cool completely (the 9X13-inch cake can be cooled completely in the pan if you don’t plan to invert and ice all the sides). At this point, once the cakes are cooled, they can be wrapped in plastic wrap and put in a ziploc bag and placed in the freezer for up to 2 months. Thaw at room temperature prior to frosting.

When cake is cool, mix cream cheese, butter, sour cream, and vanilla at medium high speed in clean bowl of standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment (or in large bowl using handheld mixer) until well combined, about 30 seconds, scraping down bowl with rubber spatula as needed. Add confectioners’ sugar and mix until very fluffy, about 1 minute.

Frost cooled cake and dollop with apricot preserves or sprinkle it with nuts or whatever else to make it look fancy.