Ginger Carrot Cake with Cardamom Cream Cheese Frosting

This recipe is not so much mine as it is as a thoughtful riff on this one by Alton Brown. I would never have come up with adding yogurt to cake mix on my own.

2.5 cups all purpose flour
1.5 cups carrots, grated (I used about 6 carrots)
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp cinnamon, freshly ground if you can
1/4 tsp nutmeg, freshly ground if you can
1/4 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp salt
1-1/3 cups white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
3 eggs
3/4 cups of plain yogurt (I used Greek)
3/4 cups vegetable oil
1/3-1/2 cup pecans, chopped
1/3 cup raisins, dried cranberries, or both

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and make sure the rack is positioned in the middle of the oven (I always forget).

Start by grating the carrots into a large bowl--precision grating isn't the goal here as much as rendering whole carrots into tiny, bakeable pieces. I used a combination of grating and chopping and managed to get the job done. Just call it rustic!

Mix together the dry ingredients--flour, spices, baking soda and powder, salt--and add to grated carrots, making sure to coat the carrots well. Then mix the egg, sugar, yogurt, and veggie oil in a food processor or mixer. (I actually mixed the sugar with the dry ingredients by accident, which I'm sure violated some fundamental rule of baking chemistry, but the cake survived and was still delicious.) Add this to your floured carrots and mix well. Stir in the pecans and raisins until everything is incorporated.

Grease and flour two 6 inch by 2 inch round cake pans, and pour in the batter. In terms of pan size, since I don't know anyone with a full set of cake pans in their kitchen, just make sure that the total volume (circumference x depth, in this case 6 x 2) for both pans is equivalent or less than what the recipe recommends. Alton's recipe called for one 9 inch by 3 inch pan, which equals 27 (and wouldn't make a very impressive looking cake, if you ask me), and my 6 inchers combined equal 24. So I comfortably filled the pans, and had surplus cake when I shaved off the tops.

Bake the pans on the center rack for 45 minutes, and then decrease temp to 325 and bake for another 20 minutes or so. The center temp of the cake should be around 205 degrees if you have a cooking thermometer, but the toothpick test works about the same--if it comes out gooey, it needs more time; if it's clean it's done. After they come out of the oven, let the cakes cool in the pan for 15 minutes, and then put them on a rack until they cool completely.

(This is when I made the mistake of cooling them on the kitchen table, where Jibs took a bite out of the top of one! There he is above earlier in the process, in a much less mischievous mood.)

Cardamom Cream Cheese Frosting

1 cup, or 1 8oz. package of cream cheese
1/4 cup, or 2 oz. butter, softened to room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp cardamom, freshly ground
2 cups powdered sugar

Mix the cream cheese and butter in a mixer or food processor until just blended. Add the vanilla extract and cardamom, and mix until incorporated. I cannot stress enough how infinitely better fresh ground cardamom is to pre-ground. We buy whole cardamom pods from Indian markets here, remove and discard the shells, and keep the seeds in a grinder dedicated to this purpose. It's a labor of love, for sure, but soo worth it--and not something we need to refill more than once a year.

Add the powdered sugar in 1/4 cups at a time and blend until smooth. (I almost feel like you could get away with 1 and 3/4 cups of sugar for this recipe, as the frosting was really sweet.) Refrigerate for 5-10 minutes before icing the cake.

Icing the cake:

This was my first time making a layer cake, so I was a little intimidated. Thanks to some research on the worldwide foodweb, however, leveling a cake is not so daunting. The strategy I used (to relative success) was to slide a knife an inch or so into the cake at the lowest point of the crown, and slowly rotate the cake while keeping the knife level. From there you can cut across the center of the cake to remove the crown (which is a delicious preview for the rest of your cake, and the scraps can be used for other yummy desserts).

Do this as evenly as possible on both cakes, and spread a modest layer of frosting on top of the bottom layer. You'll want the cut side of both cakes facing each other, so the smooth pan edges are what people see. After stacking, spoon a generous amount of frosting on top of the cake, and begin spreading the frosting from the center down around the sides. My technique was not a scientific process (again, it's rustic!), but didn't look bad at all. Enjoy!

Showing off Christmas presents: my cake stand was a gift and homemade by my friend Mandy--visit her vintage clothing store on Etsy here (no home products, unfortunately, unless we bug her to make more...). My gorgeous double sided apron is from my friend Laura.