Easy Carrot Cake Loaf with Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients

To make my Carrot Loaf Cake recipe, you’ll need the following simple ingredients:

• Carrots: Bugs Bunny’s favourite snack! While a cake is never going to be healthy, carrots are full of gut-healthy fibre and Vitamin A. This is a great way to sneak a few more vegetables into your diet.
• Flour, Sugar, Baking Powder and Salt: The building blocks of a great cake! Plain or all-purpose flour is suitable for this recipe. I use both white and brown sugar for sweetness and flavour. You’ll also need powdered sugar for the cream cheese frosting.
• Milk, Eggs and Oil: These are the main liquid part of the cake. I always use vegetable oil in cakes like this carrot cake, which will keep it moist for days. You can use melted butter if you prefer, though it will make the cake a little more crumbly. I prefer a neutral oil like sunflower or canola oil, but you could use a very mild olive oil if you like.
• Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Allspice and Vanilla: This carrot cake has plenty of warming spices – if you can’t get hold of them individually, you can substitute with a good pumpkin spice blend.
• Cream Cheese: What would carrot cake be without cream cheese frosting? It’s important to let the cream cheese soften to room temperature before whipping it with the sugar. Adding a little butter will help it set.
• Nuts: I like to use walnuts in the cake and a mixture of roasted nuts for the topping.
• Fruit: Topping the carrot cake with fresh or dried fruit takes it to another level!

Instructions

I love this recipe as it is so reliable and makes such a moist carrot cake! The basic instructions are below, but the detailed instructions are in the recipe card at the bottom of the page.

1. First, prepare to cook by heating the oven to 180°C / 350°F / Gas 4 and greasing, then lining a 25x12cm (10 x 5 in.)  loaf pan with baking parchment paper.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together all of the wet ingredients. In a medium bowl, stir together the dry ingredients, then fold the dry ingredients into the wet, mixing until just combined. Add the carrots and walnuts and mix through the carrot cake batter.
3. Pour batter into the prepared loaf pan, smooth the surface, then bake in the preheated oven for 1 hour until risen and golden brown. Test for doneness with a skewer inserted into the center of the loaf, then allow to cool in the loaf tin for 10 minutes before carefully lifting out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
4. While the carrot cake is cooling, make the frosting by whisking the cream cheese and butter together until well combined (Pro tip: cream cheese and butter must be properly at room temperature, or they won’t combine! An electric mixer or a hand mixer makes this super easy). Sift over half of the powdered sugar and stir through, then repeat with the remaining sugar, salt and lemon zest. Chill until the cake is completely cool.
5. When the carrot cake has completely cooled (and I mean completely – if you frost the cake too early, it will simply slide off), either pipe or spread the frosting thickly onto the top of the loaf, then decorate it with chopped nuts and fruit. Delicious!