This Carrot Bundt Cake is moist, perfectly sweetened, and topped with a delicious cream cheese frosting. It is the only carrot cake recipe I use with perfect results every time!
Of all the ways to enjoy carrots, I think we can all agree that baking them into a cake is at the top of that list. i mean, it is cake and who doesn’t love cake?
This perfectly spiced carrot cake is baked in a bundt cake and topped with the most delicious cream cheese frosting. Add some chopped pecans to that cake for a little crunch and you really have something pretty darn tasty. As far as I am concerned, that is the perfect cake right there.
My Carrot Bundt Cake recipe is my absolute favorite recipe for classic carrot cake. After years of tweaking to get it just right, this is the only carrot cake recipe I use- my absolute favorite carrot cake! It’s perfectly moist, sweet (but not too sweet), and so fluffy. If you are a carrot cake lover like I am, be sure to also check out my Carrot Cake Cupcakes recipe which is based on today’s recipe.
While you can bake this cake in a regular cake pan, I prefer baking it in a bundt cake for a few reasons. First, its an easy way to make a show-stopping cake with beautiful height. Secondly, I find slicing and serving this cake for parties to be so much easier when in a bundt cake.
Making the cake is super easy too! The hardest part is shredded all the carrots but if you have a food processor, that tasks a breeze.
Ingredients in this Carrot Bundt Cake recipe
- Flour: All purpose flour.
- Baking powder and baking soda
- Salt
- Warm spices: Ground cinnamon, ground ginger, ground allspice.
- Eggs
- Sugar: Both white granulated sugar and brown sugar.
- Apple sauce: Helps achieve a moist cake without adding too much fat (aka butter or oil).
- Greek yogurt: Similar to the apple sauce in that it replaces some of the oil in this cake, adding extra protein instead while still helping achieve a moist cake.
- Vegetable oil: Just 1/2 a cup of vegetable oil is added to the cake. You can substitute another similar, mild tasting oil instead.
- Vanilla extract
- Carrots: shredded carrots are the star in this recipe. A whole pound goes into this cake.
- Crushed pineapple: drained
**Note: Ingredient quantities and full instructions are in the recipe card at the end of this post.**
How to make this Carrot Bundt Cake recipe
- Grate the carrots. Grate carrots in a food processor or with a box grater. Set aside.
- Mix the dry ingredients. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together all of the dry ingredients. Set aside.
- Mix the wet and dry ingredients. Place all of the wet ingredients except for the carrots and pineapple in the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment. Blend well until everything is well combined and creamy. Add the dry ingredients and blend to form the batter. Add the grated carrots and pineapple and blend until combined.
- Bake. Pour the carrot cake batter into the bundt pan and bake in a preheated oven for 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Let it cool for 20 minutes in the pan and then carefully run a butter knife around the edges to ensure it is loose. Carefully flip it onto a wire rack to cool completely before frosting.
How to make homemade Cream Cheese Frosting
While this cake is downright delicious, the best part of this cake (and any cake) is the frosting. Especially when that frosting is cream cheese frosting!
There are just 4 ingredients for the cream cheese frosting on this carrot cake:
- Cream cheese: softened (1 brick or 8oz)
- Butter: unsalted butter, softened
- Confectioner’s sugar: aka icing sugar or powdered sugar
- Milk
Once the cake is completely cooled, make the frosting by adding the cream cheese, butter, and icing sugar to a food processor with the paddle attachment. Blend on medium speed until it is light and fluffy Slowly add a little milk (1 tablespoon at a time) and blend. If needed, add a little more milk to reach the desired consistency. You can control how thick you would like your frosting to be by controlling how much milk you mix in. Drizzle over the cooled bundt cake and top with chopped pecans.
Tips for the perfect, moist carrot cake
Tip #1: Grease your bundt cake pan well. In order to ensure your cake comes out of the pan nicely, you have to make sure you butter the pan generously and flour it too. I add a little flour to the buttered bundt pan and then shake it around to coat it all. This has helped prevent the cake from sticking and falling apart when you want to flip it. That’s no fun at all!
Tip #2: Grate your own carrots. While you can certainly do this with a box grater, it is way easier to let the food processor with the grating attachment do the work for you. Another tip- don’t be tempted to take a shortcut and use matchstick carrots or store-bought pre-shredded carrots as they don’t cook as well in the time the cake bakes and it will affect the consistency of the cake. They tend to be hard and dry whereas fresh carrots are moist and pliable.
Tip #3: Cool your cake. Another important tip is to make sure that you let your cake cool as specified in the recipe. Trying to frost even a slightly warm cake will cause your frosting to melt.
Tip #4: Use room temperature ingredients. In order to ensure a smooth icing, make sure your ingredients are at room temperature. Set them out earlier in the day or, if you forget to, I “defrost” them in the microwave for several seconds until they are soft.
Storing your carrot bundt cake
Carrot cake can be covered or placed in an airtight container and stored in the fridge for several days. It tends to hold up well for days so don’t feel like you need to bake it at the last minute. Unlike most cakes, carrot cake is actually better after it sits for a bit, I find.
Can you freeze this carrot bundt cake recipe?
Yes, carrot cake can be frozen. If you want to make this cake in advance and freeze it, I recommend not frosting it so that it can be more easily stored without fear of ruining the frosting. If you are doing this, once its cooled, wrap the baked carrot cake in layers of plastic food wrap and then place it in a freezer safe container.
Leftover frosted carrot cake can also be frozen. While you do run the risk of smudging the frosting while storing it, who really cares how it looks if you can enjoy delicious carrot cake all over again? To store leftover carrot cake, cover the slices or portion of cake you wish to freeze well with layers of plastic wrap and then place it in an freezer bag.
I hope you love this easy carrot cake as much as I do! This flavorful carrot bundt cake recipe is one I make often for birthdays, Mother’s Day, and especially for Easter dessert!
Happy baking!
-Cathy
You may also like:
Carrot Cake Cupcakes
Blackberry Coffee Cake
Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting
Carrot Cake
Ingredients
Dry Ingredients
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
Wet Ingredients
- 4 large eggs
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 3/4 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup apple sauce
- 1/2 cup Greek yogurt
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 3 cups carrots shredded (about 1 lb carrots)
- 1 cup crushed pineapple drained
Cream Cheese Frosting
- 250 g cream cheese softened (1 brick or 8oz)
- 1/2 cup butter softened
- 2 cups confectioner's sugar aka icing sugar or powdered sugar
- milk
- 1/4 cup pecans chopped
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F and generously grease a bundt pan with butter. Flour it lightly.
- Grate carrots in a food processor or with a box grater. Set aside.
- In a large bowl, whisk together all of the dry ingredients. Set aside.
- Place all of the wet ingredients except for the carrots and pineapple in the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment. Blend well until everything is well combined and creamy. Add the dry ingredients and blend to form the batter. Add the grated carrots and pineapple and blend until combined.
- Pour the batter into the bundt pan and bake in the oven for 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Let it cool for 20 minutes in the pan and then carefully run a butter knife around the edges to ensure it is loose. Carefully flip it onto a cooling rack to cool completely.
- Once the cake is completely cooled, make the frosting by adding the cream cheese, butter, and confectioner's sugar to a food processor with the paddle attachment. Blend on medium speed until it is light and fluffy Slowly add a little milk (1 tablespoon at a time) and blend. If needed, add a little more milk to reach the desired consistency. Drizzle over the cake and top with chopped pecans. Serve!
Note: Metric ingredient measurements are provided as a courtesy using a third-party calculator and are rounded to the nearest unit. The recipes provided on this site have not been tested with metric measurements and their accuracy cannot be verified.
Nutrition
The nutritional information provided is based on third-party calculations and is an estimate only. Accurate nutritional facts will vary based on the particular brands used, portion sizes, measurement accuracy and more.
