Cayenne Carrot Cake

Yield: One three tiered 8-inch cake

Ingredients:

For the cake

• 1 cup (93g) pecan halves or pieces
• 1 pound (about 4 cups shredded/454g) carrots
• 2 inch piece (~16g) unpeeled fresh ginger
• 2 1/2 cups (320g) flour
• 2 tsp (8g) baking powder
• 1 1/2 tsp (6g) baking soda
• 1 tsp (3g) Diamond Crystal kosher salt*
• 3 tsp (6g) ground cinnamon
• 2 tsp (4g) cayenne pepper**
• 1 tsp (2g) ground ginger
• 1 tsp (2g) freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 tsp (<1g) ground cloves
• 1 cup (200g) dark brown sugar
• 2/3 cup (133g) granulated sugar
• 4 large (200g) eggs
• 1 cup (245g) whole milk/full fat greek yogurt
• 1 1/4 cup (260g) neutral oil (such as grapeseed or vegetable)
• 1 tbsp (12g) pure vanilla extract

For the frosting

• 12 tbsp (1 1/2 sticks/170g) unsalted butter, softened
• 1 pound (454g) full fat cream cheese, softened
• 4 cups (512g) powdered sugar
• 1 tsp (4g) vanilla paste
• 1/2 tsp (2g) Diamond Crystal kosher salt*

For the candied carrots

• 1 1/2 cups (300g) granulated sugar
• 1 1/2 cups (222g) water
• A few rainbow carrots***

Directions:

1. Toast your pecans: Place your oven racks into the upper-middle and lower-middle positions. Preheat your oven to 350°. Dump your pecans onto a small baking sheet and spread into a single layer. Place them on the low-middle wrack and let toast for 8-10 minutes or until they smell deeply toasted and have darkened in color. Set aside when done, but leave the oven on you’ll be using it to bake your cakes shortly. Once cooled, roughly chop the pecans.
2. Shred your carrots and fresh ginger: While your pecans toast, shred your pound of carrots using the large holes on a box grater. I suppose you could also used a food processor to grate your carrots, but where’s the fun in that. Grate your fresh ginger into the shredded carrots using the smaller holes on the other side of the box grater or better yet, a microplane. Set aside.
3. Line your pans: Line three 8-inch cake pans with parchment paper, and grease lightly with neutral oil. Set aside.
4. Whisk together your dry ingredients: In a medium bowl, whisk together your flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, cayenne, ground ginger, black pepper, and cloves. Set aside.
5. Whisk together your wet ingredients: In a small bowl, whisk together your yogurt, oil and vanilla until combined.
6. Prepare your batter: In a large bowl, combine your sugar and eggs and whisk fervently for 1-2 minutes, or until your eggs have slightly thickened and the mixture has lightened in color (this should be a little arm workout). Add in half of your wet ingredient mixture and work into the eggs and sugar mixture using a rubber spatula until thoroughly combined. Add in half of your dry ingredients and gently fold until combined. Scrape in the remaining wet mixtures and fold until combined. Do the same with the remaining dry, careful not to overmix. Add in your carrots, ginger and pecans and fold the mixture until it is all evenly distributed.
7. Bake: Divide the cake batter evenly amongst the three cake pans. It’s best if you use a scale to make sure they’re perfect even, but if you don’t have one your eyes should do a fairly good job. Place two pans on the lower-middle rack and one on the upper middle and bake until the cake bounces back when pressed gently along the edge, or a toothpick comes out clean, 26-30 minutes, swapping the racks halfway through baking. Pull from the oven, and set aside to cool in their pans.
8. Make your candied carrots: While your cakes cool, prepare the candied carrots. Turn down your oven to 225° and line a large baking sheet or two with parchment paper. Using a vegetable peeler, shave strips off of your carrots. These can look however you want, thinner strips for a mosaic like decoration, or thicker ones for a crown effect (pictured). Combine your sugar and water in a large saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat, swirling occasionally to help dissolve the sugar. Add in your carrot strips and reduce the heat to medium-low. Continue to swirl the pan, and allow the mixture to simmer until the carrots have cooked through, 12-15 minutes. Drain your carrots and lay the strips onto your prepared baking sheets, careful not to overlap. Bake until the carrots are slightly translucent and tacky, 30-35 minutes. Set aside to cool.
9. Make your frosting: Fit your stand mixer with the paddle attachment (you could use a hand mixer for this too) and beat your butter and cream cheese together on medium-high until they are thoroughly combined, 1-2 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and beat again for a minute more. Scrape down the sides again, add in your powdered sugar, and lay a towel over the top of the mixer (to prevent your kitchen from becoming a winter wonderland) and gently pulse the mixer to incorporate. Once combined, turn the mixer up to medium high and whip until light and fluffy, about a 1 minute. Scrape down the sides of the bowl, add in your vanilla paste and whip for a minute more.
10. Assemble and frost the cake: Make sure your cakes are complete cooled and begin assembly. Place a little dab of icing in the center of your cake stand/serving plate/etc. Place one of your cake layers upside down**** onto the dab. Slide a few pieces of parchment under the edges of your cake, so that you can keep the platter clean when frosting. Spoon about 1-1 1/4 cups of frosting onto the top of the layer. Spread using the back of a spoon or offset spatula so it reaches the edges. Place your next layer, upside down, on top of this and repeat. Place your final layer, upside down, on top of this. Spoon another 1-1 1/4 cup of icing on top of the cake and spread it over the top and sides, doing your best to evenly coat it in a very thin layer. Bits of cake will peek through, but this is just a crumb coat so that’s fine. Put your cake in the fridge to firm up for at least 15-20 minutes. Once the crumb coat has hardened, pull the cake from the fridge and dump the remaining frosting on top of the cake. Using an offset spatula swoop your frosting over the top and down the sides of the cake until you are happy with the look of it. Once done, pull out the parchment strips. Set it in the fridge to firm up again, 15-20 minutes.
11. Garnish and serve: When you are ready to serve*****, take your candied carrots and gently press them into the frosting to adhere them to the cake. When you are satisfied with the look, cut and slice the cake. The cake will keep in the fridge for about 5 days.

Notes:

*If you’re using any other type or brand of salt (i.e. Morton, or sea salt), I suggest scaling back to 1/2 tsp.
**Feel free to scale back depending on how much spice you like, but I find this to be the perfect amount to stand up next to everything else in the cake.
***I like rainbow cause it’s a more striking visual, but feel free to just go with orange if that’s your vibe!
****These cakes bake off pretty even so placing your layers upside down prevents you from having to level them at all.
*****Don’t put the candied carrots on too far ahead of time or they’ll lose a bit of their texture (especially from the moisture in the fridge).
Do Ahead: You can make the cake layers up to 2 days ahead and keep them covered in the fridge until ready to assemble.

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