Carrot Cake with Orange Cream Cheese Frosting and Arthritis Walk

Tyler and I have done the Arthritis Walk to raise money for the Arthritis Foundation since he was 1 year old- It used to be him in a stroller but now he raises his own money and walks it all. He has beaten me in almost every year with the money he raises for this good cause. I guess cuteness counts! Our team including ever vivacious Julie, her son and Linda raised almost $2000 this year. Tyler saw a young man who lost his vision from his arthritis at the walk and he commented that he did not know arthritis could do that and how sad that was. I told him that rheumatoid arthritis that the young man has is a disease that affects the whole body not just the joints and we need a cure of this disease some day and that is why we are working so hard to raise money for this cause. Thank you to all of you on the team and who donated to our cause, it will make a difference!

This year it was at the Guadalupe River Park and the San Jose Shark mascot was there so we got to goof a little before the walk. I think Tyler's favorite part was the candy tables they have as you go around. His right pocket was busting with candy at the end of the walk.

I've gotten a couple of requests for my Carrot cupcake recipe that I made for Tyler's birthday celebration at school so I thought I'd share that here. It's from America's Test Kitchen recipe book.

Carrot Cake- makes one 9x 13 sheet cake or 24 cupcakes.

Adjust oven rack to middle and heat oven to 35 degrees. Lightly coat the pan with vegetable oil spray and line bottom with parchment- or use cupcake liners.

Whisk together in large bowl and set aside:

2 1/2 Cups AP flour
1 1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp salt

Whisk together in large bowl until forthy and sugar is mostly dissolved about one minute:
4 large eggs at room temperature
1 1/2 C granulated sugar
1/2 C packed light brown sugar

While whisking above egg/sugar mixture, slowly add in:
1 1/2 C vegetable oil until thoroughly combined and emulsified about 1 minute.

Whisk in the flour mixture until no streatks of flour remain.

Stir in 1 pound of peeled and grated carrots. (Best to use shreddding disk on food processor or large hole of box grater- DO NOT USE PRESHREDDED CARROTS as they are too thick and will leave you with a crunchy cake.

Pour into prepared pan and bake until wooden skewer insered comes out with few crumbs attached 35-40 minutes- rotating pan halfway through baking. (for 24 cupcakes bake 30 minutes) Let cool in pan on wire rack 2 hours.

option: stir in 1 1/2 C toasted and chopped pecans or walnuts and 1 C raisin into the batter with the carrots.

Orange Cream Cheese Frosting: This is the most yummy soft frosting ever! and it only takes about 30 seconds to make total with a food processor! Although it may take a good 5 minutes to lick the bowl and the spoon after.....

Process in a food processor until combined about 5 seconds:
8 oz cream cheese softened
5 Tablespoon unsalted butter softened
1 Tablespoon orange juice
1 Tablespoon grated orange zest

Add 1 1/4 C confectioner's sugar until smooth about 10 seconds, scraping down bowl and blades as needed.

Enjoy!

Lynda






Lynda