Aunty Muriel’s Farmhouse Carrot Cake is an all-time family favourite that goes WAY back in my life. As a little girl I loved to visit my great Aunty Muriel.
Aunty lived in a big old farmhouse high on a hill overlooking the St. Croix River near my hometown of St. Andrews, New Brunswick. I remember her huge vegetable garden and a tire swing hanging from the bowed branches of an old willow tree. That tree was just a hop, skip and a jump across the yard from the creaky screen door of her kitchen.
Once in awhile when I’m on a farm in Alberta, I’ll catch sight of a tire swing hanging from a tree and my mind will race back in time. I see that little girl I was swinging with all her heart, her cotton dress fluttering and flying up all around her. She’s laughing and throwing her head back to catch the rays of the sun as a warm summer breeze rustles the soft leaves of the giant old willow above. Twirling, twirling, twirling – whenever I make this cake, I ice it with swirls and twirls and remember again the joy of time on a family farm.
Read on for my Aunty Muriel’s Farmhouse Carrot Cake recipe. I’ve noted all the farms I was able to support in the making of this beautiful cake. Aunty would have liked that.
Aunty Muriel’s Farmhouse Carrot Cake
Time: 60 minutes
Yield: 8 to 10 servings
Equipment: Stand mixer, 3 round cake pans, parchment paper
- 3 cups raw carrots (about 12 large carrots), grated by hand or in a food processor (Lund’s Organic)
- 2 cups unbleached all purpose flour (Highwood Crossing Foods)
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 2 cups sugar
- 1⅓ cups canola oil (Highwood Crossing Organic)
- 4 large eggs (Mans Organic)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- Preheat the oven to 350°F.
- Coat 3 – 9-inch round cake pans with butter and then line the bottoms with parchment paper.
- Combine the grated carrots, flour, baking soda and cinnamon in a large mixing bowl and stir to coat all the carrots. Set aside.
- Place the sugar and canola oil in the bowl of a stand mixer and beat until smooth.
- Add the eggs one at a time; beating until smooth and scraping down the sides of the mixer between additions.
- Add the vanilla followed by the carrot mixture and beat again until smooth.
- Divide the batter between the 3 cake pans and bake on the middle rack for 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
- Remove the cakes to racks to cool 10 minutes then remove them from the pans by inverting them and peeling off the parchment paper.
- Let them cool completely before icing.
Cream Cheese Icing
- 8 ounces cream cheese (Vital Green Farm)
- ½ cup unsalted butter (Sylvan Star)
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 2 cups icing sugar
- Place the cream cheese and butter in the bowl of a stand mixer and beat on 8/10 speed until creamy and smooth.
- Add the vanilla followed by the icing sugar slowly and beat until smooth – another 3 to 4 minutes at least.
- Use about a quarter cup between each layer and then ice the top and sides with generous swirls and twirls.
