The best carrot cake EVER!
„I don’t like carrot cake.“
Or at least I thought I didn’t. Turns out I just hadn’t found the right recipe. So what changed?
Rewind to a couple of weeks ago: After my last sad attempt at making a carrot cake, I was pretty certain I would not try another recipe. I thought to myself:
„Maybe I simply don’t like this kind of cake.“
But when I was browsing the Internet for some new baking recipes I stumbled upon this carrot cake recipe from the YouTube Channel „Cupcake Jemma“, and I thought, why not give it one last go. Maybe this is the one.
And it was!
I have NEVER in my life had a carrot cake as amazing as this one. Maybe I hadn’t tried enough cakes, maybe my last baking attempts had been truly terrible, I don’t really know but as soon as I tried this cake I knew the recipe was a keeper!
Each cake layer was super moist, just the right amount of sweet, with a slightly cinnamony flavor. Add cream cheese frosting to it and you get the perfect autumnal/wintery cake!
If you happened to be looking for the perfect autumn/winter cake then definitely read on! (Or go watch Cupcake Jemma’s Video on it)
But either way, give this recipe a try!
For the Carrot cake:
420g plain flour
480g caster sugar
250g finely ground walnuts
2.5 tsp cinnamon
3/4 tsp salt
1.5 tsp baking powder
1.5 tsp bicarbonate of soda
6 eggs
450ml vegetable oil
375g finely grated carrots
For the Cream Cheese Frosting:
170g butter
270g cream cheese
930g icing sugar
+chopped walnuts to decorate
Making the Cake:
First, preheat the oven to 175 degrees Celsius.
Once that's done, grind the walnuts and finely grate the carrots.
Next, sift flour, cinnamon, baking powder, salt, and baking soda into a separate bowl to remove any lumps. Add the ground walnuts and mix everything well.
In another bowl, mix eggs and sugar together for one minute. Slowly add the oil to the egg-sugar mixture and whisk at high speed for about 30 seconds. Add the carrots and stir them in at low speed.
Then, add the dry ingredients to the liquid and gently blend everything together at a slow speed with the mixer. Note: Do not overmix!
Pour the batter into 4 greased and floured cake pans, each with a 20 cm diameter. (If you only have one or two pans, you can also bake the cake layers one after another)
Bake the cake at 175 degrees Celsius for 20-25 minutes.
Making the frosting:
In the meantime, prepare the cream cheese frosting. First, beat the butter at the highest speed for 5 minutes until creamy.
Add the cream cheese and beat for another minute. Sift powdered sugar and add it to the cream cheese-butter mixture. Mix the powdered sugar in 2 batches, incorporating each batch for 3-5 minutes. Transfer the finished cream into a piping bag and refrigerate it.
Assembling the Cake:
Allow the baked cake layers to cool, then trim the tops evenly so that it is level on both sides.
Note: Save the trimmed cake pieces for decoration.
Now, retrieve the cream cheese frosting from the refrigerator and start stacking the cake. Don't apply the cream cheese layers too thick (about 1 cm), as the cream can be somewhat "liquid," and may run out to the sides. If necessary, stabilize the cake in the middle with a wooden skewer.
Next, coat the outer sides of the cake with the cream cheese frosting, as well as the topmost cake layer. Smooth everything out nicely.
Decorate the outside of your cake with the saved cake scraps from earlier. To do this, crumble the cake pieces and press them gently around the edge of the cake. This way your cake gets a lovely homemade/rustic look, which I personally adore!
Finally, decorate the top of the cake by placing whole walnuts around the rim. (They don’t just look pretty, they can also be used to space out the individual pieces.)
Bon Appétit
I sincerely hope you will enjoy this recipe as much as I do!
For a day to day serving I would suggest halving all of the ingredients, so you will end up with 2 layers instead of 4. If you are baking for a lager group of people the original measurements are absolutely perfect!