My little Amy loves carrots. She’ll eat them pretty much any which way they come. She’s been asking to bake cupcakes and as we only had these orange cases left on Election Day when their school was closed, I decided to go with carrot flavour. Carrots are a great source of beta carotene which is absorbed as Vitamin A. More is released when they are cooked so they were a nicely balanced healthy treat!
A slightly different take on carrot cake
You’ll need
For the cakes
- 175g soft unsalted butter
- 175g caster sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 small carrots
- 175g self raising flour
- 2 tbsp milk
- 12 cupcake cases
For the decoration
- 80g soft unsalted butter
- 250 icing sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 tbsp milk or carrot juice
- 1 small carrot
To make them
- Preheat the oven to 180C and put the cupcake cases into a 12 hole muffin tin.
- Beat the butter for about 10 minutes – it should be really light and fluffy.
- Add the caster sugar and beat for another 5 minutes.
- Whisk the eggs lightly with the vanilla extract and add them about a teaspoon at a time. patience is key here to prevent curdling.
- Grate the carrots with a microplane/fine grater, squeeze the juice out (cook’s treat!) and then beat them into the mixture too.
- Sift and fold in the flour with the milk.
- divide the mixture evenly between the cupcake cases and bake for 20 minutes. A cocktail stick should come out clean and they should be golden brown.
- Leave them in the tin for a few minutes to cool and then move them to a wire rack to cool completely.
- To make the decoration, first grate the carrot and lay out onto some kitchen paper to dry out.
- Beat the butter until it’s really light and fluffy.
- Add the icing sugar a little at a time and then beat in the vanilla extract and milk/carrot juice.
- Beat it til it’s really light and fluffy and then spoon over the cooled cupcakes. I really don’t have much patience for piping but you can if you like.
- Sprinkle over some of the grated carrot on top and that’s it. Lovely!