Ultimate Carrot cake with Sour Cream Frosting
There is something about pound cakes that are just a perfect pair for me by a good cup of coffee or tea. carrot cake is a light dessert cake and is not heavy or sweet like the fancy cream cakes, it’s the perfect cake for entertaining when you need to make a big amount of cakes for a big crowd.
Carrot cake guidelines
Just throw all ingredients to your mixer bowl and you’re fine, right? well you might have an eatable cake but it will not be a great one, here’s some pointers I’ve picked up over time.
- mix the butter and the sugar for a relatively long period of time, I mix for at least 7 minutes, we want to end up with a puffy pale mixture.
- Use a big amount of carrots, it’s not a real carrot cake without a heavy carrot presence, plus, having a big amount of carrots adds fibers and nutritional values, it also allows us to reduce the amount of sugars dramatically because of the high natural sugar amount in the carrots.
- Bake for at least an hour when using the large pound cake pans, it might sound like a lot of time but a pound cake which is not fully baked will be a disaster. Check for consistency of the cake by inserting a toothpick to the cake every 10 minutes after 50 minutes of baking to make sure the cake is perfectly baked, not undercooked and not overcooked (nobody like a dry cake).
- Use spices, carrots just go so well with cinnamon, vanilla, nutmeg and ginger, but don’t overuse them since they are very aggressive in flavor.
- Don’t be afraid in using whole-wheat flour, it’s a great match for this cake, it will add depth of flavor while the texture still remains light and airy as with white flours.
Carrot cake frosting, do I really need it?
You really don’t, I like the cake without frosting just as I like it with frosting, the icing adds depth of flavor as well as a different texture, but it’s up to you if to add it, the cake is just as good without it.
I see on many recipes heavy cream frosting that takes time, effort and adds a lot of calories, it’s not needed, I always use a simple sour cream and sugar icing, baked for a few minutes to become stable, that’s it, I’m after the sour taste to contradict the sweet flavor of the cake.
Carrot cake is a great cake to make, I always recommend beginners to start with this cake since this cake will bring good results for the new bakers but for the professionals, you can make a great cake that any restaurant will be happy to serve with
Happy baking!
Ingredients
Instructions
Set a stand mixer bowl fitted with the paddle attachment, add the softened butter and sugar, whisk for about 7 minutes, until the mixture is pale and airy.
add the eggs one at a time, wait until fully incorporated and drizzle the oil.
Add the dry ingredient to the mixer bowl and whisk for another 2 minutes until smooth.
Pour in the water, vanilla extract and date honey, mix for 1 more minute.
Pour the batter into the loaf pan, or 2, if you’re interested in 2 smaller cakes.
Bake for 1 hour to 1hour 15 minutes, depending on the portion of the carrot cake in the pan.
Insert a toothpick to check that the inner cake is ready, it should be dry with wet crumbs on it.
While the cake is cooling down, we will prepare the sour cream frosting by adding the sour cream, powdered sugar and vanilla extract to a bowl and mixing gently with a spoon (the sour cream frosting amount is for one loaf, if making 2 smaller cakes double the quantities).
Release the cake from the loaf pan and cover with the frosting.
Place back in the oven for another 7 minutes (not more than that), we just want the frosting to stabilize a bit.
