Carrot Loaf Cake!
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An easy carrot loaf cake with cream cheese frosting – easy, delicious, and the perfect easy bake!
My favourite!
So.. carrot cake. It’s safe to say I am slightly obsessed with it?! Largely because it is probably one of my favourite cakes, if not my actual favourite.. but there we are. My favourite flavour can change frequently but put a piece of carrot cake in front of me and I will always be happy.
Anyway, with my readers love for loaf cakes rising just as much as mine, I figured it was time to make this bad boy into a carrot cake. I have oodles of carrot cake related recipes already on my blog, such as the classic carrot cake, and even my carrot cupcakes!
Carrot loaf cake
Making a carrot loaf cake is really quite similar to the rest of my other carrot themed bakes, but it’s all about the proportions. Sometimes just fitting a cake into a loaf tin doesn’t work – sometimes it does, but I’ve altered this to fit my favourite loaf tin.
Carrot cake is soft, it’s moist, and it’s delicious. You basically can’t go wrong with something such as carrot cake. Honestly, I find it so hard to over bake and ruin it – and this can often come from the ingredients.
Walnuts
This time, I used walnuts in the sponge. I didn’t put walnuts in the title, but technically this is a carrot and walnut loaf cake – but the walnuts are optional. You can switch them to a different nut, such as pecans, or switch it completely to use raisins! However, I know they are just as controversial.
One thing I love about using nuts in the sponge though is the crunch. It’s delicious. I get that some people don’t like texture changes though – and to be honest, carrot cake is just as delicious without them!
Butter free cake
Not only does the carrot itself bring incredible moisture to the sponge, but so does the oil! The cake is butter-free, and uses oil instead – and it’s amazing! It’s so incredibly easy to mix up. You definitely don’t need to use a mixer, and in all honesty, you probably shouldn’t!
Don’t over mix and bake straight away!
Even though the cake is hard to ruin, you definitely don’t want to over mix it. You also want to bake it straight away, and not let it sit for too long. Because the raising agent is different from your typical cake, it shouldn’t be left to sit – as that can ruin the sponge.
Cream cheese frosting
I decided to top this one with my all-new cream cheese frosting – and I’m so glad I did! In my other classic carrot cake I used buttercream as I made it for my dad, and mostly buttercream is easier. However, because this is a carrot cake – cream cheese frosting is an ideal combo!
Top tips!
Cream cheese frosting has to be stored in the fridge once it’s been used, as it’s a ‘fresh’ product – but the wonders of carrot cake mean it’s okay. The cake shouldn’t dry out and it works really well!
Also, because this is in loaf cake form… it’s so easy. Whack it in the loaf tin, slather the frosting on top, and decorate if you fancy! There’s nothing special to it, other than enjoy every last morsel when you eat it. Literally, every single crumb.
I, basically… am obsessed with this recipe. If you want to try out a different version, be sure to just put Carrot Cake in the search bar and you will find my obsession continues! Either way, HAPPY BAKING! x
Carrot Loaf Cake!
Ingredients
The Cake!
- 175 ml sunflower oil
- 3 large eggs
- 200 g light brown sugar
- 250 g grated carrots
- 100 g raisins/walnuts (optional)
- Zest of 1 orange
- 200 g self raising flour
- 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 2 tsp mixed spice
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp nutmeg
Cream Cheese Frosting Glaze
- 125 g unsalted butter (room temp)
- 125 g icing sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 250 g full-fat cream cheese
Decoration!
- Fondant carrots
- Chopped nuts
Instructions
Cake
- Pour the sunflower oil & eggs into a large bowl and add the sugar – mix lightly and combine.
- Add the grated carrots, raisins/nuts, and orange zest and fold through to combine.
- Add the flour, bicarbonate, mixed spice, ginger, cinnamon & nutmeg and mix again – try not to over mix!
- Pour the mixture into the tin, and bake in the oven for 55-60 minutes. Sometimes it can take a little longer so test with a skewer!
- Once baked, leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes, and then cool on a wire rack. If your cake doesn't come out, it may not have finished baking, or you didn't line the tin well enough!
Cream Cheese Frosting
- Beat your butter on its own for a few minutes to loosen it.
- Add in the icing sugar, and beat again - I beat this for about 5 minutes, to make it really smooth.
- Make sure your cream cheese doesn't have any excess water - I find it best to add it to a bowl first just to make sure.
- Add in the cream cheese, and vanilla and beat. At first, it may look a little weird, but just keep on beating. I end up beating it for a few minutes - it can go through a lumpy stage first, but eventually, the lumps beat out and it's smooth and thick!
- Once beaten - it should be lovely and thick.
Decoration
- Slather your cream cheese frosting over the top of the cake!
- Decorate with chopped nuts, carrot decorations or whatever!!
- Enjoy!
Notes
- I used this loaf tin!
- This cake should be stored in the fridge because of the cream cheese frosting, and will last for three days!
- You can use 100g of raisins, or 100g of nuts... this time, I used walnuts!
- If you want any more information on my cream cheese frosting, read this post!
- If you want to make a different sort of carrot cake - search my blog as I have many variations!
- The spices are optional, but they make a delicious flavour!
ENJOY!
Find my other Cupcake Recipes on my Recipes Page!
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J x
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Hi
Can I use Demerara sugar instead of light brown sugar?
Yes! You can also use caster sugar, golden caster or granulated! x
Wow, it’s so scrumptious. Thanks for sharing the wonderful recipe.
When you grate the carrots are they grated on the normal side or the small side so the carrots not to big.Silly question also how much in cups is the carrot.Thank You.
I use the normal side – you don’t want the pieces too small! And I’m really sorry but I don’t know – I don’t measure in cups!
Hi Jane!
This recipe looks so yummy and I’d love to make it as a tray bake. Would that change anything about the method? – for example, cooking time or oven temp?
Can’t wait to try it! X
I would look at my carrot traybake recipe as it’s already built for a traybake tin! x
Hi, my tub of cream cheese is only 200g, would it be OK to just use this amount or would the recipe need adjusting?
Many thanks 😁
I would adjust the butter and sugar to be 100g! x
Hi, I can only find soft cheese , not cream cheese in my local supermarket . Is that the same?
Hiya, yeah its the same thing x
How long would you bake this for mini loaves? I would love to make this in my mini loaf pans, or even cupcakes, so I could enjoy it longer. Husband really doesn’t like carrot cake, but I do.
Tiffany
I really don’t often bake mini loaves that often so I haven’t tried it with this recipe – I do have a cupcake version already on my blog though so have a look at that!
This was AMAZING
Made for the first time yesterday and it was perfect!
Jane’s website is always my go-to for all things baking, easy to follow recipes & always delicious results!
I had struggled with carrot cake & cream cheese frosting in the past using recipes from other websites & they were disastrous!
Made this yesterday…was so yummy!
I don’t have any sunflower oil…. Can I use any oil instead?
Not really any oil, no. Vegetable oil is the best substitute – but other oils can leave quite a strong taste.
Hi Jane, do you publish the nutritional content on any of your recipes, if not do you know of a quick way I can work out calories per serving? I looove baking and particularly I follow a lot of your recipes, but recently I’m trying to track what I’m having as I have a lot of weight to shed, but I still want to be able to enjoy enjoy baking your recipies, just knowing amount per serving…
Hiya! I do, but at the moment it’s just not working so will be back up and running soon hopefully!
Brilliant!
I’m a massive fan of cakes in loaf cake form at the moment… One piece of kit (a very standard 2lb loaf tin does everything you could want), no pressure to decorate in a fancy way, easy to portion, not unfathomably big for just two people in lockdown.
The other half “doesn’t like” cream cheese frosting, but I bet yours will convert him…
Cheers Jane!
Yesss! Loaf Cakes are so good aren’t they!! And I hope you both love it!!
Please send me your recipe
It’s on the post! You will have scrolled past it to leave the comment.
Hi Jane ,could i use 50g of walnuts and 50g of raisins? I can’t wait to try this..
Yep for sure!
Hi Jane, is it possible to use plain flour and baking power instead of SR flour? I cannot get my hands on any at the moment! (& if so, how much should I use?)
Also, thanks for replying to my cookie question; they worked a treat!
Yes you can! You whisk in 2 level tsps of baking powder per 150g of plain flour before using in a recipe – it’s sometimes easier to make a larger batch! You can then store it as self raising. And that’s okay!!
I love this carrot cake it came out so well, thank you. I was wondering i want to make a fruit cake would it be the same sort of thing but with out the carrot would that work?
Not for this recipe as the carrot is really key to the ingredients x
Why did you use bicarbonate of soda and not baking powder as one of the raising agents. I get really confused with these two. It is probably a science thing as you have baking powder in with the flour.
They are two different types of raising agents, and they react to different other ingredients, and do different things. This recipe requires the bicarbonate of soda!