Why-I-Joined-Zaar Carrot Cake

Lennie's Note:

On October 2, 2001, I discovered the Recipezaar Web site. I immediately joined so I could post a request for a recipe I had lost. In less than an hour, I had a reply: this recipe. Unfortunately, I never posted it into the database -- until now. My mistake. This cake was the reason I joined, and the friendly response I received was the reason I stayed!

• Total Time: 1 hrs 5 mins
• Prep Time: 20 mins
• Cook Time: 45 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 12

CAKE

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 3/4 cups white sugar
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 3 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups shredded carrots
• 1 cup flaked coconut
• 1 cup chopped walnuts
• 1 (8 ounce) can crushed pineapple, drained

FROSTING

• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
• 1/4 cup butter, softened
• 2 cups icing sugar

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9x13 inch pan.
2. Mix flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon; make a well in the center and add sugar, oil, eggs and vanilla. Mix with wooden spoon until smooth.
3. Stir in carrots, coconut, walnuts and pineapple. Pour into 9x13 inch pan and bake for about 45 minutes. Don't panic, the centre will sink a little.
4. Allow to cool; when cool, ice the cake. You can certainly use your favourite cream cheese frosting to ice this cake, but the one I've included is highly recommended (I usually leave the cake in the 13x9 pan and just ice the top).
5. To make the frosting: Cream the butter and cream cheese until smooth; add the icing sugar and beat until creamy.

Reviews

[gardeningRI]

Bye-bye bakery carrot cake, hello homemade! This recipe is amazing as written & we are so happy to have found it!!! We do make a few substitutions: sub whole wheat pastry flour, pare down the sugar to 1 1/4 cups, decrease oil to 1/2 cup & add 1/2 cup applesauce, and add 1/2 cup golden raisins. We prefer to bake this in 2 round cake pans for 30-35 minutes, though it works well as sheetcake & cupcakes alike. This recipe is fabulous as written & provides endless options for those who want to tweak it just so. Thank you for getting me out of the bakery & into the kitchen for outstanding carrot cake!

[Asian Sensation]

This recipe definitely deserves 5 stars! I made cupcakes instead and took them to work only to receive raving reviews. One lady said it's better than anything she could get store-bought. Some modifications I made after reading previous reviews: 1) applesauce instead of oil, 2) pecans instead of walnuts, 3) decreased to 1 cup of sugar 4) baked 18-20 minutes since I made cupcakes. Also, I let the dried coconut soak for about 15 minutes in boiled water. Then I strained it and added to the batter. That way the coconut is not as dry. Finally, I used a piping tip to swirl the icing on top...they looked absolutely delightful =)

[Chef #1342515]

Looking for a delicious cake recipe and came across this one. It looked like a carrot cake recipe I had clipped from a magazine many years ago, so I thought I'd check to see how it was different. I discovered it was the same recipe (although the frosting uses only 3 oz. of cream cheese), but noticed the directions were a little more specific for the cake. My recipe says to use sifted flour and then, before adding wet ingredients, says to sift flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon into a large bowl. Thought I would mention it as I think this helps to assure all of the dry ingredients are mixed thoroughly. Additional comment (next day): Another change, I think that makes the directions clearer is to use sifted confectioner's sugar (called Icing sugar in the recipe) and also add 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. It made a nice creamy easy-to-use frosting. I made my cake in two 9-inch round pans (baked for 40 minutes) and had plenty of frosting (using the 8 oz. package of light cream cheese) to frost both layers.