mix, mix… stir, stir

There are those that consider the idea of vegetables in cake to just be wrong, but this carrot cake is right in every aspect. Quiet the protesters with a pint of ice cream while you grab a fork and indulge in this carrot cake bliss.

Bill’s Big Carrot Cake from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking From My Home to Yours delivers toothy, moist, well balanced carrot cake satisfaction. This recipe doesn’t mess around calling for three cups of grated carrots along with raisins, coconut, and walnuts, but despite being so loaded with goodies it isn’t heavy, overly sweet, or confused by spices. Cinnamon carries the spice role solo and I encourage you to splurge on some beautiful fresh cinnamon for this cake. I used a spicy bold Vietnamese Cassia that carried the other ingredients along beautifully.

This is a quick cake to put together with no fussy steps to cause problems. If you don’t have a food processor to grate the carrots, it will still be an easy cake to make especially if you recruit a helper to do the grating. It is not suggested, but I prefer to toast nuts before adding them to recipes. I find the flavor to be deeper and the crunch of the nut more responsive and satisfying.

You might think a straightforward cream cheese frosting is about as perfect as it gets and I would have agreed until I made it with vanilla-infused powdered sugar. The vanilla adds a rich warm flavor element that balances out the sweetness of the frosting. I recently started tossing my used vanilla bean pods into powdered sugar rather than granulated sugar because it seems that I use powdered sugar in applications where the flavor of vanilla would be desirable, but not the color or the extra liquid that comes with using vanilla extract. It was a delicious result and now all my used vanilla bean pods will be happily tucked in a jar of powdered sugar to infuse that intoxicating flavor in the next batch of royal icing, bunt cake glaze, or cream cheese frosting.

The carrot garnishes are made from gum paste. After getting hassled about making a vegetable cake, I decided to really drive home the point with a little vegetable garden. I found that I needed just a bit more frosting to fully frost and decorate the cake, another half batch did the trick and left a bit extra to spread on graham crackers.

This carrot cake adventure was inspired by Tuesdays with Dorie, a cooking community intent on cooking one recipe a week from Baking From My Home to Yours. So, each Tuesday I will post my results and you too can join in the fun by signing up at Tuesdays with Dorie. This book has become one of my favorite baking books and I highly recommend adding it to your collection. Because this isn’t my recipe I have not posted it, but you can buy a copy of the book here or at most book stores. Next Tuesday will feature Fluted Polenta and Ricotta Cake.