Snowflake Carrot Cake

So lately I've had several requests for carrot cake, which I've never tried before because I don't really like it. I think it's a texture thing -- the cake is full of stringy carrots and nuts. I really dislike nuts in cookies, cakes, brownies, etc. We should talk about nuts some time. There are great uses for nuts. Chopped and thrown haphazardly into desserts is not one of them. But I digress. Carrot cake!

This carrot cake turned out amazingly moist and perfectly warm with more than a hint of cinnamon and clove. Here's a  peek at the final cake: Snowy and cool on the outside (January needs more appropriately wintery desserts) and warm deliciousness on the inside.

Did I mention that the kicker here, that actually forced me to go for a carrot cake recipe, was that it was our friend Crispy's birthday. Crisp absolutely adores winter/snow/christmas at all times and in all things and in all places. So we went for it!

Here's a shot of one of the six-inch rounds that I stacked  and later layered with the icy blue cream cheese frosting.

Since I had never even attempted a carrot cake, I searched the internet for "best" carrot cakes, and finally landed on Paula Deen's recipe for the best carrot cake cupcakes. The recipe was really easy to follow and (surprise to me) called for crushed pineapple, which I thought sounded absolutely delish. I made a few very slight modifications to the recipe, but overall, I think it's great.

[Below] Process: frosting an orange crumby cake with wintery cream cheese frosting. 

Lito and I worked for a couple hours the night before with gum paste and these lovely snowflake punches (you'll remember them from this snowflake pie post). We added edible silver glitter, which I'm a little undecided about -- I think in some of the snowflakes it just looks like ash, but I don't know, maybe it adds depth? Anyway, after both layers of cake were frosted, we went to town with these little buddies.

Of course I made accompanying snowflake cupcakes:

Happy Birthday to our friend Crispy!

Chomp!

Carrot Cake

Here's What You Need:

*4 Eggs

*3/4 C vegetable oil

*1/2 C apple sauce

*1 C sugar

*1 C brown sugar

*1 C crushed pineapple (well drained)

*3 t vanilla

*2 C flour

*2 1/2 t baking soda

*2 1/2 t baking powder

*1/2 t salt

*2 t cinnamon (ground)

*1/2 t nutmeg

*1/4 t ground cloves

*3 cups of grated carrots (note: Paula says to grate carrots on large side of grater. I say: no thanks. Put baby carrots or chopped carrots into a food processor and let her rip. Three cups of carrots took less than five minutes.)

Here's What You Do:

Okay, so you've prepped your carrots, right? Right. Okay, then preheat the oven to 350, and get your pans ready. I did two six-inch rounds and 20 cupcakes.

In a stand mixer with the whisk attachment, mix up the eggs, oil, apple sauce, white and brown sugar, pineapple, and vanilla. 

Switch to the heavier mixing attachment and add the flour, baking soda, powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. Add the carrots, carefully on a low speed.

Note: The batter will be runny. Don't freak out. Just bake it up. 

Bake cupcakes for 17 minutes, or bake small rounds for about 30 minutes. 

Cream Cheese Frosting

Here's What You Need:

*1 8-oz pkg cream cheese

*3 T butter, room temp.

*2 t vanilla

*1 2-lb pkg powdered sugar

*milk (approx 1/8-1/4 C)

Here's What You Do:

Mix the cream cheese and the butter. Add vanilla and a few tablespoons of milk. Alternate milk and powdered sugar until you have the consistency of frosting you like. Voila!