Carrot Cake with Vanilla Bean Cream Cheese Frosting & Candied Pecans

Spring has sprung here in Austin. This is beyond my favorite time of year. It’s warm and breezy (yet bug-free), but the mornings are still cool. Our weekends have been spent mostly outside, in the garden, tending to the maj. bounty that’s happening seemingly before our very eyes. I’ll go outside with my coffee at 8am, look at a potato sprout, and swear it’s doubled in size by 4pm. It’s like magic…magic you can eventually eat. My preferred form of sorcery.

I talk about our tiny garden a LOT. Not just here and on social media, but to anyone who will listen. It’s not just because I think produce is gorgeous and I deeply, deeply care about the quality of our food. The main reason lies in what a source of pure joy gardening is for us. Like, true, lasting, joy. Not fleeing happiness. Some highlights: The full-circle effect that comes from watching a tiny seed in dirty ground you toiled over first sprout, then bloom, and produce fruit. The magical moment when you realize you’re absent-mindedly identifying baby sprouts that a brief time ago, you would have fully thought were weeds. The shock at onions that taste ~oniony~. Discovering how fuzzy tomato leaves get right before they get their flowers- and how incredible they smell. The magical moments that make us so grateful for what we’re able to (literally) sow into. I want more people to experience this for themselves. We owe this tiny backyard of ours more than we can say.

This week, we were able to reap our 1st small harvest of 2023, in these gem-like bunches of carrots. I sowed these before we left for Europe on our honeymoon in September. Frankly, I knew it wasn’t a great idea. The season had really just passed, but I was feeling remised about how little involvement I had in the garden while wedding planning and book-writing that year, and just wanted to squeeze out one more crop, dang it! I almost pulled them out quite a few times as we were prepping for spring, and it felt like precious real estate to waste on stringy little roots. I examined, and saw a few creeping along in size, and decided to pull out all the tiny guys to give them their best chance at maturing. I knew the clock was ticking and it might be a waste, but hey, this is what we do with gardening- WE TRY…and very often we fail, but still, WE TRY. Well much to my shock, awe, and delight, the thinning of the herd helped, and we got a decent small crop! I have the really small guys purposed for pickling, but I’m still deciding on the fate of their larger brethren. My parents will be visiting us for Easter, so perhaps round, ahem, 4, on this carrot cake is in the cards.

So, let’s talk carrot cake. Are you pro? Are you one of those raisin-hatin’ babies who answered my IG poll? JK I fully knew that would be polarizing ;) I’ll level with you: I’m a carrot cake convert. It was never my favorite, and now, well, this baby rose to being in my top 3 favorite cakes (that I make). The inspo? A husband whose favorite cake happens to be carrot cake, but me, wanting to enjoy it and elevate it just ever so slightly.

What makes this cake great? A few things:

1. It’s incredibly moist. The carrots get soaked in a mixture of whole milk/yogurt that lends itself to the tenderness of the crumb. As does some cake flour mixed in with our all-purpose. There is also pineapple, and brandy-soaked raisins that help in this department. We also have a combo of butter and EVOO as our fats. Olive oil, in my opinion, is a way underutilized baking ingredient here in the states. Have you ever used it? Rarely will you have dry results.

2. It’s more complex in flavor than your average carrot cake. The addition of orange zest with the pineapple feels lightly tropical.

3. Fluffy, not-too-sweet cream cheese frosting with a good dose of vanilla bean. I feel that one speaks for itself.

4. Candied pecans. Two ways. I discovered when testing this recipe that when making the candied pecans, any smaller, smashed pecan pieces take on this delicious, praline dust-like consistency that I loved. I decided to utilize that to coat the exterior of my cake, and then rimmed the perimeter of the top layer in the whole candied pecans. You do you. Let me be the first to say, when it comes to cake decorating, I’m in the easy is best camp. We already made the cake. Let’s cross the finish line.

5. I tested this recipe several times with cake in my fridge for at least 24 hours, and a couple times with 2-day old cake. Can I just say…it made zero quality difference. Make this ahead, and by all means, pull it out to stun your guests with its beauty.

Carrot Cake with Vanilla Bean Cream Cheese Frosting

For the cake:

1 1/2 cups cake flour

1 cup all-purpose flour

2 t. baking powder

3/4 t. baking soda

1 1/2 t. salt

1 1/4 t. ground ginger

1 3/4 t. cinnamon

1/2 c. raisins

3 T. brandy

1 T. water

4 eggs, room temperature

1/2 c. butter, melted and cooled

1 c granulated sugar

3/4 c. brown sugar

2 t. vanilla bean paste

1/2 c. whole milk

1/2 c. whole milk plain yogurt

4 large carrots, shredded

1/4 c. extra virgin olive oil

1/2 cup pineapple, finely chopped

2/3 cup pecans, chopped

For the Vanilla Bean Cream Cheese Frosting (adapted from Claire Saffitz)

13 oz. cream cheese, room temperature

3/4 c. unsalted butter, room temperature

1 t. vanilla bean paste

Good pinch salt (taste and adjust)

4 cups powdered sugar

For the Candied Pecans (optional, but do it):

1/3 c. granulated sugar

3/4 t. cinnamon

1/2 t. salt

Few gratings fresh nutmeg

1/2 lb. pecans

1 egg white

1 T. water

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Line two 8-inch cake pans with parchment. In a small saucepan on low heat, combine the water and brandy. Add in the raisins and heat on lowest setting until raisins are plump and have absorbed the liquid. Set aside to cool.

2. In a large bowl, combine the flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger, and cinnamon.

3. Whisk together whole milk and yogurt. Add in carrots, making sure all are covered. Set aside to soak while you combine your wet ingredients.

4. In the bowl of a stand mixer fit with a whisk attachment, cream together eggs, melted butter, sugars, and vanilla bean paste for about 5 minutes on medium speed until pale and thick. Slowly stream in the extra virgin olive oil with the speed on low, and beat 1-2 minutes more.

5. Swap out the whisk attachment for the paddle attachment on your stand mixer. Alternately, if mixing manually, grab a spatula for folding. Alternate adding in the carrot/milk/yogurt mixture with the flour mixture, beginning with the flour mixture. Add in 3 additions, gently mixing on the lowest speed. Add in pecans and pineapple, mixing on lowest setting.

6. Scrape into your prepared cake pans and bake for 30-40 minutes, until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool completely before decorating. I allow mine to cool, then I wrap them in plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight. I find the chilled cake easier to decorate.

7. Make the cream cheese frosting. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, combine your cream cheese, butter and vanilla bean paste. Gradually add in powdered sugar until everything is smooth, fluffy, and combined. Transfer to a bowl and cover to surface with plastic wrap. Refrigerate until ready to decorate.

8. Make the candied pecans. Whisk sugar, salt and spices. Whisk egg white until foamy. Toss all with pecans and transfer to a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake, tossing every 10 minutes or so until nicely golden brown and caramelized. Set aside to cool before decorating.

9. Decorate that cake, baby! I’m truly no cake decorating expert, but an offset spatula is your friend here. Remember what I said earlier about blending up those candied pecans and plastering them all over the exterior of your cake? Well, there’s your solution to any frosting flub.
   
   

So, I know I’m re-making this again for Easter. I know I’m hosting. There are people coming, and there will be food, but I’m having a real mental debacle of whether to go brunch or dinner. This cake is breakfast-friendly. Trust me, I’ve done the legwork.

I hope this spring is making you feel fresh and new, full of new ideas, and excitement for what’s to come, and in the mood for some carrot cake.