Mommy Friendly Recipe-Amazing Carrot Cake!
Let me just start by saying I am a cook, not a baker. Not a professional cook mind you, just a mommy who has a career of thinking of a menu on a daily, minute by minute basis for my family like all of us moms. This is a daily challenge that we all face. That being said I love to cook but I dread baking. I am not a stay at home mom who fills my days with thinking of which cookies that I can make for my child’s class party or bake sale. Don’t get me wrong-I often volunteer to do so but on the rare occasion I have baked I have literally ran in the classroom and quickly handed my child’s teacher the voluntary baked good a.ka hockey puck I have made for that day in the hopes the teacher forgets the origination of the hockey pucks. I mean lets all admit it as moms we try to make something phenomenal in the kitchen but just as you are stirring the cookies or timing them in the oven is when your child who of course was fine when you started the baking ordeal decides to have a meltdown. Or as you are carefully measuring ingredients your child has called you by their name of choice which at this point for me is “mama” which although on most days I love hearing but when you are concentrating on cooking you wish you could tune your child’s voice out ;] Even today when my child who I would give my life for is home with me for the 3rd school snow day but the 6th days we have been snowbound chooses to call me “mama” which I love hearing I wish I could enter the witness protection program and just change my name until the snow melts ;]
That being said there is one thing that I can bake and that is the Carrot Cake Recipe that my mother-in-law gave me 8 years ago. I wanted to give this to all of my Blog Friends as a gift-it is an amazing recipe! My husband loves it and the true test is he asked for it on his birthday this year. That normally would not have been an issue because my husband is a saint and even though if I cook something he does not really care for he compliments it over and over again-that is love. So for his birthday I decided as one of his presents I would bake his mom’s Carrot Cake. For days before I built up the excitement and then went and bought all of the ingredients which for me seals the deal that I will be baking-but then I got the phone call that as moms we all fear when we are doing the baking endeavor. My mother- in- law called to tell me that she and my father- in- law would be joining us for my husband’s birthday. I love my in- laws and was looking forward to their visit but unfortunately my mother- in- law already knew I was baking “her” Carrot Cake so the pressure was on.
As the day approached I was nervous to bake the cake let alone bake “her” cake in front of her. All of a sudden my husband’s birthday cake became a test that I needed to pass for my mother-in-law. My husband and I have been together for almost a decade but a little background for you-I had just baked my mother-in-law a cake 2 months prior for her birthday which in a way to give me some helpful advice she let me know I had left it in the oven too long and that was a Betty Crocker Cake, not “her” Carrot Cake. So on my husband’s birthday I set out on the impossible task to bake the cake with my mother-in-law supervising a.k.a. helping me bake it. Let me say she was helpful and supportive during the whole process but it was nerve racking-I wondered if there was a way I could break down and cry during the whole thing but instead I had my daughter- in- law voice that I could make this. As the beating of (the ingredients-not me) and the measuring went on I saw her watching but I kept saying to the voices in my head “I can do this.” The cake came out of the oven at 10 am but I knew that the true test would not be until after dinner. So I kept glancing at my test all day praying that it would be good. Finally when the moment arrived and the candles were lit for my husband I could not bite into the cake quickly enough. YES!!!!!!! I thought to myself-this is darn good. My husband could not compliment it enough. But the true victory came when my mother-in-law after her first bite said “I could have not made this any better.” WOW!!!!!
So now that you know the story behind this cake I want to share it with you. It is foolproof and is a recipe that your family and even your mother-in-law will love.
Also I have a helpful hint for you that I learned the hard way. If possible use new flour, baking soda and baking powder. In the past in an effort to save money I used old ingredients and the cake fell and was a disaster. This time I used all new ingredients.
My Mother-in Laws Amazing Fool Proof Carrot Cake
Prep Time: 30 Min
Cook Time: 45-50 min-check with tooth pick in center at 45 min. Based on your oven-mine took 48 minutes.
Ingredients:
Cake
2 Cups Sugar
4 Eggs
1 ¼ Cup Vegetable Oil
1 teaspoon Vanilla
2 cups flour
2 teaspoons Baking Soda
2 teaspoons Baking Powder
2 teaspoons Cinnamon
1 teaspoon Salt
4 Cups Grated Peeled Carrots (I buy the 5 pound bag of “Earthbound Farm Mini Peeled Carrots” at Costco and put them in my food processor). I do not as a mom have time to peel and grate carrots, plus the one time I did I lost skin off of my fingers and it took hours to grate!
¾ cup raisins
¾ cup walnut pieces
Frosting
8 ounce brick of softened cream cheese
½ stick butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 box of confectioner’s sugar
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Beat sugar, eggs, vanilla and vegetable oil together with mixer until thick. Sift together flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon and salt together and blend into egg mixture. Fold in carrots, raisins or nuts. Bake in greased/floured (I used “Pam”) 13 x 9 cake pan.
While the cake is cooking make the frosting. This makes a lot of frosting and I have overdone it so be careful not to over frost the cake ;] For the frosting make sure your cream cheese and butter are soft and beat the cream cheese, butter, vanilla and confectioner’s sugar until fluffy. My mother-in-law insists that if you leave the frosting out of the refrigerator it spreads easier. Make sure your cake cools about an hour before frosting.
Enjoy!!!!!
