Carrot Cake with Roasted Carrots and Maple Cream Cheese Frosting
Serves 8
Adapted from All Tarted Up
For Roasted Carrots:
8 ounces carrots, peeled and cut in half, lengthwise
2 tablespoons maple syrup
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
For Maple Cream Cheese Frosting:
¾ cup butter, room temperature (I used a combination of salted and unsalted butter)
16 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
4 tablespoons maple syrup
3 cups powdered/confectioner’s sugar
For Cake:
3¾ cup flour
2 cups pure cane sugar
1 tablespoon brown sugar
¾ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons cornstarch
2½ teaspoons baking soda
2½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
¼ teaspoon ground cloves
¾ cup almond milk, room temperature
½ cup vegetable oil
¼ cup butter, melted
4 eggs, room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup apricot preserve or jam
4 ounces carrots, peeled and grated
½ cup raisins, soaked in rum or honey liqueur
For Roasted Carrots:
** It’s important to roast the carrots first! If you don’t roast them and only use raw, grated carrots, the carrots will have too much moisture, which will impact the batter and how it cooks. You’ll end up with a softer cake that’s not set.
Preheat the oven to 350° F and line a baking sheet with aluminum foil.
In a large bowl, add the 8 ounces of carrots, maple syrup, and cinnamon. Toss the carrots until they are fully coated with syrup and cinnamon. Spread them in a single layer, evenly across the baking sheet.
Cook until tender, about 45-60 minutes, depending on thickness. If the carrots are smaller, check after 40 minutes to make sure they’re not drying out or burning.
Once done baking, let the carrots completely cool. Add them to a food processor and pulse until coarsely minced. Aim to have the roasted carrots about the same size as the grated carrots. Set aside.
For Maple Cream Cheese Frosting:
In a medium bowl, beat the butter until light and fluffy. Then add the cream cheese and keep beating until smooth.
Add the sugar and keep mixing the frosting until smooth. Pour in the maple syrup and mix until fully incorporated.
Cover and leave in the refrigerator until ready to use.
For Cake:
Preheat the oven to 350° F and grease two 8-inch round cake pans with butter or cooking spray.
If you plan on soaking the raisins in something, do that now. The raisins should soak for about 30 minutes, but don’t oversoak them.
In a large mixing bowl, sieve the flour and add the sugars, salt, cornstarch, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. Whisk everything together until well combined: no more white streaks, no more clumps, and the dry mixture has taken on a uniform color.
Pour in the almond milk, vegetable oil, and butter and mix well until fully incorporated.
Add the eggs and vanilla extract and mix until just combined, scraping the sides and bottom of the bowl to avoid lumps of dry ingredients.
Add the apricot preserves and the minced roasted carrots. Mix until the preserves have been fully mixed in and the carrots are evenly distributed.
Fold in the soaked-raisins and the grated carrots and mix until just combined.
You want to avoid overmixing the batter. As each ingredient is added, mix only until the batter is evenly combined.
Evenly distribute the batter between the two cake pans. Bake for 40-50 minutes, until a toothpick comes out cleanly from both cakes (use separate toothpicks to test the two cakes).
Let the cakes cool completely on the counter, at least an hour! This is important: if the cakes are still warm and you add the frosting, it will melt and run off the cake.
When you’re ready to build the cake, cleanly cut off the rounded top of at least one of the cakes.
If you only cut off the top of one cake, that cake will be the bottom layer and will make stacking the other half on top easier.
I cut the top off of both cakes, because I like the cleaner look (plus it gives me some scraps to snack on!)
Spread a good helping of cream cheese frosting on top of the entire bottom cake. Make sure you spread the frosting all the way to the edges!
Stack the other cake half on top of the frosting layer and continuing decorating the cake (top and sides) with frosting how you see fit!
Enjoy!
