Thursday, April 14, 2011

Fast, easy AND delicious!

We are BIG fans of carrot cake here at the Carter house.
In fact, when Craig I got married, our wedding cake was a carrot cake. :)

I have tried  several recipes over the years,
but have never found one that we have loved enough to make again and again.

Now that 3/4 of our children are no longer residing here and with Craig being gone most of
every week to track meets, I haven't been baking a whole lot.

No sense baking when I would be the one eating the majority of the baked goods.
And if you've ever caught a glimpse of my girth,
you'll understand why I should avoid anything that could potentially add to it.

But, I found a recipe from good 'ol Martha Stewart that is fast, easy and delicious!


I would love to pass on the recipe to you!
:):):)


Spiced Carrot Cake

1/4 c vegetable oil    (I used butter) 
1 c all purpose flour (I used 1/2 c. wheat and 1/2 c. white flour)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (I used pumpkin pie spice)
2 lg. eggs
1/2 c granulated sugar
1/3 c packed light brown sugar
1/3 c low-fat plain yogurt (I used an orange flavor because I didn't have plain and it was yummy!)
1 c finely chopped carrots

Preheat oven to 350*. Grease and flour an 8-inch baking dish.
In a medium bowl, stir together flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt; set aside.
In a small bowl, whisk eggs, sugars, yogurt, and oil until smooth. Gently mix egg mixture into dry ingredients until moistened. Mix in carrots. Transfer batter to prepared pan. Bake 35-40 min. or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 15 min. and turn out of pan. Cool completely right side up.
Apply glaze or confectioners sugar on top.
(Glaze- 1/2 c. confectioners sugar with enough liquid (water, milk, apple juice) to make an appropriate texture to drip over cake top. I made mine extra thin.)

This cake is healthier than most! It's light and fluffy and very tasty. If you like nuts, I think they could be easily added as well.

I usually always have shredded carrots in the freezer to use for recipes like this. When we have an over abundance of things like carrots, zucchini, peppers, onions or celery, I chop them in the food processor and freeze them in freezer bags in 1/2c. to 1c. portions. They can be thawed and put in recipes like this, or I even add them to soups and sauces.

                           I also wanted to share this fun little preschool activity that we did today.
We have been learning about our community helpers this week and today we talked about firefighters.

This was provided by a really great preschool mom. :)

The truck is a piece of bread with a square cut out of the top. It's covered with strawberry jam.
The window is a Cheezit. The ladder is made of pretzels.
The wheels are Oreo cookies with the creme filling removed. The light on top is a cherry. 

The kids had a blast making them AND eating them!


Enjoy your day!

4 comments:

Linda - Behind My Red Door said...

Well now, a post right up my alley ...food and preschool fun! I am definitely adding that cake to my recipe box. It has much less fat and eggs than most carrot cake recipes.

And when Lili is older, I will have to make fire trucks with her..so cute!

Have a great weekend! Hugs

Rachel said...

Carrot cake is my fav too! Will definetly have to try your recipe! The truck toast is sooooo cute! My lil man would love that!Thanks for sharing!

Anonymous said...

Thanks for posting this tasty easy sounding recipe Jo-Anne, I actually have all the ingredients in my larder (my yoghurt is Greek but I'm sure it will be fine!)so am heading off to try this right now! Greetings from a sunny Ireland today. X Nicola

Anonymous said...

Hi Joanne: OMgosh....I too am a skinny girl living in a chubby girls body!! and I love carrot cake too! Boy we have so much in common already...and we're pin keep partners over at Wendy's Ravenwood whimsies!! I am a new follower and will enjoy getting to know you through your blog...stop on over to mine too.
patti :)