Carrot Cake with Spice & Love: Cause Little Girls are Just that SPECIAL!

Yeah! It’s that time of the year, my darling daughter’s BIRTHDAY!! This year for her birthday my daughter had three requests in the cooking department. Firstly, she wanted a Carrot Cake as her birthday cake; second she wanted to make brownies all by herself as a treat for her class, and lastly she also wanted to bake a chocolate cake.

My motherly health-radar was going hay wire, now that’s a lot of sugar to be consumed in one day. Thankfully, my daughter if I may say so myself, is precocious beyond her tender times and does listen to reason. Eventually we agreed that she can bake the brownies and assist me in making her birthday cake: spiced carrot cake with cream-cheese lemon frosting.

This Carrot cake is moist, tender, warm, spicy, and bursting with love, just like my daughter!! Now you all know how much I fancy spices, so in #spicychat spirit, I added my twist to the classic carrot cake with warm winter spices and topped it with tangy lemon frosting. It is a cake that any person irrespective of their age would want this cake as their birthday treat.

 

Spiced Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese-Lemon Frosting

This easy to make carrot cake renders a dense yet moist texture, and it isn’t too sweet either. The beauty of this recipe is that you can increase or decrease the spices or omit the fruits and nuts, and it will still taste fabulous.  The addition of lemon zest and lemon extract in the frosting is the cherry on the cake, literally. Once you try my #spicychat twist to the classic carrot cake recipe, and you’ll make it a permanent addition to your collection!

 

Ingredients:

For the Cake

• 3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cups carrots, boiled & puree
• 3-4 carrots raw, grated
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/2 cup dark brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 tablespoon baking soda
• 2 tablespoon ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp ground all spice or cardamom powder
• 1 1/2 cups vegetable oil or good quality olive oil
• 4 large eggs
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups shelled walnuts, chopped
• 1 cup shredded sweetened coconut
• Cream cheese frosting

For the Cream Cheese Frosting

• 16  ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
• 12 tbs unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 6 cups confectioners’ sugar
• 1 tbs vanilla extract
• Juice of 1 lemon
• 2 tsp lemon zest

Directions:

Make the Cake

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C). Grease two 9-inch cake pans or three 8-inch pans.
2. Sift the dry ingredients with the spices into a bowl.
3. Beat oil, eggs, and vanilla in another bowl. Mix well with the dry ingredients.
4. Fold in the walnuts, sweetened coconut, and carrots
5. Pour the batter into the prepared pans. Set on the middle rack of the oven and bake until the edges have pulled away from the sides and a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean, 30 minutes approximately.
6. Cool completely. Fill and frost the cake with the Cream Cheese Frosting.

Make the Frosting

1. Cream together the cream cheese and butter until light and fluffy in a stand mixer or hand-held mixer on medium high-speed.
2. On lowest speed add the confectioners’ sugar and continue beating until fully incorporated.
3. Stir in the vanilla, lemon zest, and lemon juice and mix on medium high till smooth and fluffy.

 

 

Happy Birthday Darling! Hope this year brings you as much joy and happiness you bring to our lives!!

Join Us Thursdays at 8 PM EDT for #SpicyChat Twitter Chat to bring some spice in your lives! We Love to share ALL recipes. Simply add the #Spicychat hashtag to your link, we will RT and also add your recipes to our Pinterest Board. For more spicy inspirations, join our #SpicyChat FB Page.

 

Cake recipe adapted from Leite’s Culinaria and Epicurious.

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