Carrot Cake! With a hint of cinnamon, soft crunch from nuts, ultra moist crumb and piled high with the fluffiest ever cream cheese frosting, this has the perfect texture and flavour. Easy and foolproof, absolutely to-die for!
Carrot Cake
This Carrot Cake is from a reader, the lovely Dorothy of Tennessee in the States, a long-time reader of RecipeTin Eats. She promised it was dead easy, foolproof, ultra moist with a heavenly flavour.
One bite was all it took for me to ditch the recipe I’d been using all my life up until that moment. This was The One. Hands down the best Carrot Cake I have ever had in my life!
I love it so much, in fact, that I’ve also just published a cupcake version too!
Why you’ll love this Carrot Cake recipe
The cake itself is not too sweet, with less sugar than most recipes;
The cake is moist, but not doughy or “mud-cake” like;
The subtle crunch from pecans and coconut in the cake. The textural contrast with the crumb is really terrific; and
There is plenty of frosting!!
What you need for Carrot Cake
Here’s what you need for this Carrot Cake. The “secret ingredients” in this are:
Crushed pineapple (canned) – this adds to the moistness of the crumb, as well as sweetness and flavour. We’re going to use all of the pineapple and some of the juice; and
Coconut and walnuts (or pecans) – they add a subtle soft crunch which provides great textural contrast in this cake that has a very soft crumb.
No butter! Did you know – oil makes cakes moist and butter adds flavour. In this recipe, we don’t need butter because there’s all sorts of flavour from the other ingredients so we just use oil.
How to make Carrot Cake
Just use a standard box grater to grate the carrot. Then it’s as simple as mixing the Dry ingredients, mixing the Wet, then mixing them together.
I’ve made a 2 layer cake here but you could also make one rectangle single layer cake.
Cream Cheese Frosting for Carrot Cake
There’s just no question – fluffy cream cheese frosting is the BEST frosting for Carrot Cake! Here’s what you need:
Cream cheese – use BLOCK, not the spreadable cream cheese in tubs (too soft);
Softened butter – softened but not super soft / borderline melting;
Icing sugar aka powdered sugar – 🇦🇺use soft icing sugar, NOT pure icing sugar (which is used for things like royal icing ie sets hard); and
Vanilla.
How to make cream cheese frosting
There’s no secret trick to making fluffy cream cheese frosting. Just beat, beat, beat until fluffy! It will take a good 3 to 5 minutes to make the frosting super fluffy.
TIP for even layers (without trimming)
No cake comes out of the oven with a perfectly level surface.
But rather than bothering to cut the top to make it level, just flip the cake upside down before frosting.
You’ll still get a slight dome in the middle with this cake but it’s less pronounced than if you frosted it without turning it upside down.
And so I present to you, Dorothy’s Carrot Cake, with 2 layers, though it’s marvellous as a single layer sheet pan rectangle cake – goes further and there’s a thicker layer of frosting on the surface.
Thank you Dorothy, for sharing your wonderful recipe with us!!! I’m so honoured! – Nagi x
Watch how to make it
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Carrot Cake (Easy and ultra moist!)
Ingredients
- 440g / 20 oz can crushed pineapple , drained but RESERVE juice (Note 1)
- 1/4 cup (65 ml) reserved canned pineapple juice (from canned pineapple above)
Wet Ingredients
- 3/4 cup (185 ml) milk , at room temperature (full or low fat)
- 1 tsp white vinegar (or lemon juice or other clear vinegar, (Note 2)
- 3 eggs (55g/2oz each)
- 1 1/2 cups (265g) brown sugar (loosely packed)
- 1/2 cup (125 ml) vegetable oil (or canola)
Dry Ingredients
- 2 cups (300g) flour , plain / all purpose
- 2 tsp baking soda (aka bi carb soda, Note 3) (NOT BAKING POWDER)
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tsp cinnamon powder
Stir Ins
- 2 cups grated carrot , about 2 carrots, peeled (Note 4)
- 1/4 cup coconut , shredded or desiccated (plain / unsweetened)
- 1/2 cup walnuts or pecans , roughly chopped
Frosting
- 180g / 6oz cream cheese , at room temperature (Note 5)
- 225g / 1 cup unsalted butter , softened
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 4 cups (480g) icing sugar / powdered sugar , sifted if clumpy (Note 6)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 180°C/350°F (all oven types). Grease and line two 20-22.5 cm/8 – 9" round pans OR a 9 x 13" / 22 x 33cm pan with baking/parchment paper. (Note 7)
- Drain crushed pineapple well, reserving the juice. Measure out 1/4 cup of pineapple juice.
- Whisk Dry ingredients in a large bowl.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the milk, vinegar, eggs, sugar, oil and the 1/4 cup pinepple juice from Step 2.
- Stir in carrot, crushed pineapple, coconut and pecans into the Wet ingredients bowl.
- Pour Wet into Dry ingredients, stir until flour is incorporated.
- Pour into prepared pan(s). Bake round cakes for 35 minutes, rectangle cake for 40 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean and the cake is golden on top.
- Rest for 10 minutes in the pan before turning out onto a cooling rack. Frost once completely cool.
Cream Cheese Frosting
- Beat together cream cheese, butter and vanilla until smooth. Then beat in the icing sugar in 2 batches until it is well incorporated and the frosting is fluffy – about 3 minutes on speed 7 stand mixer.
- Flip one cake upside down on serving platter (for flat surface). Spread with 1/3 frosting. Place 2nd cake upside down on frosting. Frost top and sides with remaining frosting.
Storage
- If cooler than 25°C/77°C and not humid, ok to keep cake in airtight container not in fridge. If very humid OR warmer than 25°C/77°C, store in fridge (Note 8).
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
Originally published April 2016. Updated with new photos, and new recipe video added!
“Let them eat cake!” 10 classic cake recipes
Life of Dozer
Project Manager Dozer on duty for the video shoot! Quality Assurance is his speciality 😂
And here he is from when I originally published this Carrot Cake – no surprises, Dozer lurking under the shoot table! I’m not going to lie to you. He scored a big hunk of carrot cake. His bottom can afford it. Mine can’t.
Sorry Nagi – first recipe of yours that I haven’t thought was amazing – but it was good! It has good flavour, but I like my carrot cakes a little more rustic, with more texture. This one was a bit like when you use the blender to mash potatoes. I think I will keep my Clever Cat’s Carrot and Coconut Cake recipe (that my daughter got at kinder when they were learning about ‘C’. I think others will love it though!
Hi Cate, the texture shouldn’t be mushy at all, sounds like you may of gone wrong in the recipe somewhere?? N x
Hi, can this cake be made without pineapple or with a substitute? My husband has an intolerance to it sadly..
You might try it with applesauce.
Not this one sadly Wendy, it’s what keeps it super moist! N x
Hi,
I want to make this for my husbands birthday however he has an intolerance to pineapple (makes him violently sick) can anything else be used or can it just be left out?
Can this be made with 3 round layers?
Hi Tyler, yes you could split the batter across 3 pans for thinner layers, the cook time would be less, I’d check at about 25 minutes to ensure it’s cooked through. N x
I made this cake twice already and there are no words to describe how wonderful it is! I like putting raisins in it too! Thank you so much for the recipe!
Absolutely lovely cake. My question is……can you freeze the cake after icing it? Made it last night but can tell we’ll never get through it all
It seems like a lot of sugar (we are a pretty low sugar household). Wondering about halving the sugar as the pineapple juice is sweet as well?
Hi Cate, well it IS cake! You’ll change the texture of the cake by halving the sugar, something I haven’t tested sorry! N x
Can I make this carrot cake with gluten free flour?
I haven’t tried sorry Jillian, would love to know if you give it a go! N x
Hi Nagi, Made the carrot cake with gluten free flour. It was terrific – tasted just as good as with normal flour. Another winner from Recipetineats! Cheers Jillian
Hi Jillian, to make the cake gluten free was the flour the only thing you changed in the recipe? Did is still work well?
Thanks Sam
Yes, only changed to gluten free flour. Couldn’t taste any difference at all.
Hi Nagi, Make the carrot cake with gluten free flour. It was terrific – tasted just as good as with normal flour. Another winner from Recipetineats! Cheers Jillian
Hi can this be made with flax egg and oat milk to be vegan?
Hi can I replace the eggs with anything else to make it vegan? Flax egg?
Can this be made into a 3/4 tiered cake? Hoping to do it as a 50th birthday cake 🙂
Morning Nagi, just finished icing the cake and have had a slice! Divine, I only had pineapple slices but used the stick blender to blitz them and all was good. This is def one I’ll do again. Thank you 🙂
I would love to make this into a pumpkin carrot cake!! How would i go about incorporating pumpkin puree into the recipe? would i have to increase some dry ingredients?
Hi Nagi, I made your carrot cake over the holidays and can’t stop thinking about it. Yes, it was that good! I was thinking about making it in muffin form and having them for breakfast. Aside from lack of frosting, is there any real difference between a muffin and cupcake and would these be good without frosting? Could they be eaten warm?
Hi Katy, yes they are still good without frosting and in cupcake/muffin form as they are super moist! N x
Hi Nagi, I had thought this recipe called for frozen pineapple, so I got a bag. Oops! Can they be used for making the cake? Or I must look for crushed pineapple. I think it doesn’t hurt asking if I can save a trip to the public place. I made this cake mainly for my young sons, so very little sugar is much preferable. Do you have any advice on adjusting the recipe? Thank you in advance!
If I omit the coconut do I have to replace it with something else? Like more flour? And have you tried it in cupcake form?
Hi Michelle, that’s fine to omit, no extra flour required. I have successfully made this into cupcakes – they take about 22 minutes to cook. N x
Hi! I was thinking of making pineapple frosting for a carrot cake when I saw this recipe. Do I think if I added in A bit pineapple juice to the frosting it would taste nice or a bit OTT as there is pineapple in the cake? I wanted to make this as my Easter cake and get practicing!!
Hi Vicky, you’ll change the texture of the icing by adding another liquid to it unfortunately. I think you’d need a decent amount of juice for the pineapple flavour to come through as well. N x
Hi! I know this has been asked before but I can’t find the answer… I currently live in rural Scotland and block cream cheese is not a thing here. Any suggestions for counteracting the additional liquid in the frosting?
Thanks for all your hard work, love your recipes!
Delicious! A keeper for sure.
Hie Nagi, can i use whole wheat flour or almond?
Delicious! A keeper for sure.
Perfection! Super moist snd delicious 😋