Carrot Cake

The only thing that I can really experiment with on holidays is dessert because we have our tried and true that are served for dinner on every holiday. Holidays at my house are about tradition so I don't want to miss making someones favorite dish. But dessert, that's where you get surprised.

I do however, always make a bunny cake on Easter, it just varies on what is inside when you cut into it. Carrot cake is a favorite for my family. I made one a few years ago but it had so many ingredients, was expensive to make and weighed about 50 lbs when it was finished that I swore I would never make one again. But then I saw a post on PioneerWomanCooks.com with a Carrot Cake that looked easy and tasty. So, I gave it a a try for this Easter and it did not disappoint.

She makes it in a jelly roll pan (cookie sheet with edges) and cooks it for 20 minutes or until cooked through and she mixes in 2 cups of chopped Pecans into her frosting. Because it was a bunny and I didn't want a lumpy bunny, I put 3/4 Walnuts (didn't have Pecans) in the cake and used the rest to decorate the tie. I used 2round pans to get the "bunny" to work.

Ingredients
FOR CAKE:
2 C Sugar
1 C Vegetable Oil
4 Eggs
2 cups All-purpose Flour
1/2 t Salt
1 t Baking Soda
1 t Baking Powder
1 t Ground Cinnamon
2 C Grated Carrots
3/4 C Walnuts finely chopped
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For Icing
1 stick Butter, Softened
1 pkg (8 Oz) Cream Cheese ~ I used 1/3 fat free
5 C Powdered Sugar
2 t Vanilla

Preparation Instructions
Cake:
Mix together the sugar, oil and eggs in a large bowl with a mixer. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and combine. Then add carrots and mix well. Fold in chopped nuts. Pour into a greased pan and bake until done, 40 minutes, for two round pans.
Cool completely.
Icing:
In larger bowl, cream butter and cream cheese. Add sugar and vanilla and blend. Spread on cooled carrot cake.
Start by peeling and grating your carrots. It was 3 carrots for me to get to 2 Cups.
Mix your Oil, Sugar and Eggs with a hand mixer.
Add your dry ingredients. Add your grated carrots.
Chop up your nuts nice and tiny.
Fold those nuts into your batter.
Pour your batter into your greased pan of choice. Give it a bounce on the counter to get out the air bubbles.
Cool cake for about 10 minutes and then flip one onto a plate and one into the middle of a rectangle cookie sheet.
Cut your cake like you are cutting a baseball design. You are getting two ears and the middle will be the tie.
You just made a bunny.
Mix your softened cream cheese, butter and vanilla together.
Add your powdered sugar and this is what you get. YUMMY cream cheese frosting!
Frosting "cut" cake can be tricky. So what you want to do is to start with a big glob of frosting. Make sure you stay on top of the frosting with the knife. Try not to allow the knife to touch the cake, that's where you get a bit crumby and crumbs get mixed with the frosting. Even if you do get crumbs on your first try, it's all good, just looks like the ears have some fuzz on them;)
Sprinkle nuts on the tie. I was NOT in the mood to get out the decorating bag so I used a toothpick dunked in food coloring and ran it up and down to color the ears. Another toothpick with red food coloring to make the mouth and chocolate chips to make the eyes and whiskers. But licorice works great too.