Procrastination Recipe: Carrot Cake

Carrot cake is one of my favorite desserts, probably my favorite cake (I mean, who doesn't love cream cheese frosting?), but for me this is a bittersweet post. I was asked to make these cupcakes for my grandfather's surprise 90th birthday. I'm always looking for an excuse to make cupcakes. But this party was also a bit of a goodbye party as my grandfather is losing his year-long battle with cancer. So in typical family fashion, we came together on a snowy March Saturday with way too much food (hello leftovers!), pictures of the past, story-telling and lots of hugs. And as carrot cake is also my grandfather's favorite, I set to work to make this culinary deliciousness happen.

Sidenote: this took me two hours to make, but I was simultaneously watching tv and pausing every once in a while so as not to miss a scene.

This makes two dozen cupcakes.

Cake Ingredients:

4 eggs

1/2 cup veg oil

1/4 cup sour cream

2 cups white sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons cinnamon

2 cups grated carrot* (6 big carrots, peeled)

1 cup chopped pecans

* So I used the tiniest grate because I wanted the carrots to blend seamlessly into the batter and not be chunky. If you opt to use the bigger grate then it'll probably be more like 3 cups of carrots.

Frosting:

1/2 stick butter, softened

8 ounces cream cheese, softened

4 cups confectioners sugar (or a small box)

1 teaspoon vanilla

Of note, had I just thrown the pecans into my food processor and pulsed for a few seconds I probably could have saved myself fifteen minutes. As it was, I forgot about my food processor and chopped the pecans in small amounts. Oh well.

Chop your pecans and grate your carrots at the beginning. These are the most time-consuming steps and after this you can just combine all ingredients.

Beat together eggs, oil, sour cream, sugar and vanilla. In a separate bowl, combine dry ingredients: flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.

To your egg, sugar mixture you will alternately add a cup of carrots and a cup of dry ingredients, stirring well between each addition to incorporate all ingredients.

For cupcakes I use two full scoops of my cookie scooper to fill each wrapper. It's the perfect portion and bakes to just slightly above the wrapper (perfect for frosting).

Since I was going to be transporting the cupcakes in a car for two hours, I made the cupcakes, let them cool and then frosted them the night before (I decided to go with a more rustic look and not pipe the frosting because of the transportation issue), stuck them in the fridge overnight and they were the perfect temperature when it came serving time (and the frosting didn't melt and slide off). I would suggest keeping them in a chilled place until about 15-20 minutes before you intend to serve them.