Carrot Cake & Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting

My mother requested for carrot cake on my father's behalf so I made these cupcakes as an early Father's Day treat.

I adapted the recipe from Dorie Greenspan's book. I had tried the original recipe with crystallised ginger before but I wanted it simple this time. When I shredded the carrot, it seemed like a lot but after mixing it in, the chunky stuff seemed to disappear.


Carrot Cake
makes 30 cupcakes

2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp salt
3 cups grated carrot
1 cup chopped walnuts
1 cup dessicated coconut
1/2 cup raisins
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 cup canola oil
4 eggs

Preheat oven at 350F. Sift the dry ingredients into a bowl and mix well. In a separate bowl, toss together the carrot, walnuts, coconut and raisins. In a mixer bowl, beat the sugar and oil to combine. Add the eggs in and continue beating until smooth. Mix in the flour mixture before adding in the chunky ingredients (use a pair of chopsticks at this stage, it helps to separate the clumps of shredded carrot). Scoop into cupcake liners.
Bake for 25-30 minutes. Cool before frosting.


Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting

8 oz cream cheese
1/2 cup or 1 stick butter
4 cups icing sugar
2 tbs fresh lemon juice

Beat the cream cheese and butter until smooth. Gradually add in the icing sugar and finally the lemon juice, combining to get a creamy mixture. Frost cupcakes and refrigerate for an hour to set it.


Verdict: I usually don't eat too much of the stuff I bake, just haven't got the appetite for it once it come out of the oven but I scoffed down 2 of these as soon as it was ready. Its really yummy carrot cake!