Harvest Birthday

Wednesday was Steve's birthday and his favorite flavor cake is carrot cake. Well...I just happened to have carrots ready for harvest in my garden. One of my gardening successes! See aren't they pretty?

I found my carrot cake recipe on one of my favorite recipe sites, Simply Recipes. And this recipe did not fail! It was super delicious and the frosting had a lovely tang to it. If you have some carrots lying around, definitely try out this recipe. Yum! (Oh yeah, I also baked my cake in a 9x13 pan so I didn't have to get fancy with my frosting!)

Carrot Cake
courtesy of Simply Recipes

Cake:
3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 Tbsp baking soda
1 Tbsp cinnamon
1 1/2 cups olive oil or grapeseed oil
4 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 Tbsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups shelled walnuts, chopped (more whole or chopped for topping)
1 1/2 cups sweetened, shredded coconut
2 cups of finely grated carrots
1 cup of drained crushed pineapple

Frosting:
8 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
6 Tbsp unsalted butter, room temp
2 1/2 cups of confectioners' sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 Tbsp lemon juice

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter two 9 inch cake pans. Cut out rounds of wax paper and place at bottoms of cake pans. Butter the top of the wax paper rounds.
2. Sift dry ingredients into a bowl. Add oil, eggs, and vanilla. Beat well. Fold in chopped walnuts, coconut, carrots and pineapple.
3. Pour batter into pans. Set on the middle rack of oven and bake for 45-50 minutes (shift positions of cakes front-to-back if necessary about halfway through), until edges have pulled away from sides and a toothpick or sharp knife tip inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool on a cake rack.
4. To prepare frosting, cream together the cream cheese and butter in a mixing bowl. Slowly sift in the confectioners sugar and beat until mixture is free of lumps. Stir in vanilla and lemon juice.
5. Once cakes have cooled, frost. Sprinkle top with chopped walnuts or arrange walnut halves in a crown around the top. Serves 12-16.