Incredibly Moist and Easy Carrot Cake

This is my favorite recipe for carrot cake! It is 100% made from scratch, easy to make, versatile, and utterly delicious. One of our most popular recipes! Just read all the rave reviews! Jump to the Easy Carrot Cake Recipe

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How to Make Carrot Cake From Scratch

This carrot cake is quick, easy to make, and utterly delicious. It wasn’t until recently that we realized just how much we love carrot cake. It wasn’t something either of us grew up eating. Thanks to this easy recipe, we fell in love. You can make this cake quickly without lots of fancy equipment. Not only is this the best-tasting carrot cake we’ve made, but it’s a cinch to make. If you are looking to make cupcakes, see our easy carrot cake cupcakes recipe! It’s inspired by this cake.

More carrot recipes: Try our quick and easy roasted carrots, carrots with garlic butter, or these honey roasted carrots.

Carrot Cake Ingredients

The ingredients you need for this cake are simple and I bet you have quite a few of them already in your kitchen! The full recipe is below, but here is a quick overview:

I like using all-purpose flour, but you can substitute some of the all-purpose flour for whole wheat or white whole wheat flour. For a gluten-free carrot cake, swap the flour for your favorite gluten-free flour blend.

Baking soda helps the cake to rise. We don’t add baking powder, the cake does not need it.

Salt, cinnamon, and vanilla extract make the cake taste amazing.

Oil keeps the cake nice and moist — any neutral-flavored oil will work. (Melted coconut oil works, too, but there will be a light coconut flavor in the baked cake.)

Sugar makes the cake moist, light, and delicious. I love a combination of white and brown sugar, but you can use one or the other. Since posting the recipe, some of our readers have asked whether or not we can reduce the sugar called for in the recipe. You can, just keep in mind that the amount we specify will produce the moistest cake.

Eggs give the cake structure.

Lots of carrots make this the best carrot cake. I like to hand grate my carrots since I prefer the texture, but you can use your food processor or buy pre-grated carrots from the store. When we first tested the cake, we scaled the number of carrots back to two cups since three cups just sounded a bit extreme. After baking and letting it cool, we were a little disappointed. So if you’re making the cake and start to second-guess the number of carrots called for in our recipe below, don’t. You need all three cups. It is a carrot cake, after all.

Pecans and raisins are optional! I know that some people love nuts and raisins in carrot cake, while others cannot stand to add them. These are completely optional, so go with what you love.

Making the Cake Batter

The method for this carrot cake recipe could not be simpler! If you have a couple of bowls and can stir ingredients together then you can absolutely make this cake! As you can see from our recipe video, all you need to do is combine all the ingredients. Here’s how I like to do it:

Dry ingredients in one bowl, wet ingredients in another: I like to whisk my dry ingredients together in one bowl until they are well blended. Then I whisk all the wet ingredients together in another bowl.

Fold the dry and wet ingredients together: Then I switch to a rubber spatula or large spoon and fold the two — wet and dry ingredients — together until I don’t see any large streaks of flour. (We use the same method when making this cinnamon coffee cake, our easy pineappleupside-down cake, and this buttery blueberry cake. Both recipes are so good!)

Add carrots, nuts, and raisins: When I’ve got the batter ready, I fold in the carrots, and if I’m using them, the nuts and raisins.

Baking the Cake

When it comes to baking the carrot cake, divide the batter between two buttered and floured cake pans and bake until done. The cake layers bake in the oven for 35 to 40 minutes (they smell fantastic). After baking, let the layers cool then frost with your favorite frosting.

Frosting the Cake

We love our extra creamy cream cheese frosting. It’s soft and creamy and doesn’t firm up like some cake frostings. (If this is what you are looking for, check the notes section of the recipe, we provide a recipe for traditional cream cheese frosting).

The frosting is actually the same one we used to top our Guinness Chocolate Cake. It’s made with only three ingredients:

1. Cream cheese
2. Powdered sugar
3. Heavy cream

If you’re not into frostings or if you don’t have the ingredients on hand, try the cake as-is without any frosting at all. Or, sift a little bit of powdered sugar on top. When Adam and I were testing this recipe, we skipped the frosting the first couple of times and fell in love with the cake completely plain.

What Our Readers are Saying

If you don’t believe that our recipe helps you bake the best homemade carrot cake, take a look at what our readers are saying about the recipe! More reviews are in the comments section below.

“Thank you so much for sharing this recipe, very easy to follow, came out perfect first attempt great hit with the family, now a regular demand from my kids.” – A

“This carrot cake was amazing!!! I made it for my husband’s birthday and he said it would win a Paul Hollywood handshake (from The Great British Bake-off)” – Yuna

“This is an absolutely divine carrot cake recipe!!!! It is so hard to find one that is not dry – this one is moist and works perfectly every single time and we make it often as it is definitely our favorite!!!” – Jodi

Since posting this recipe, we’ve had some frequently asked questions. Here are the most common:

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I make carrot cake cupcakes using this recipe? Yes, absolutely (and if you read through the comments, many of our readers have done just that). To make cupcakes instead of a cake, we’d recommend baking for 14 to 18 minutes (or until a tester inserted into the center of one comes out clean). Then let them cool for a few minutes in the cupcake pan before transferring them to a cooling rack. The recipe should make about 24 cupcakes. We have been asked this question so often, that we’ve added a carrot cake cupcakes recipe to the blog (click to see it now).

Can I make one large single-layer cake? Yes, but the baking time will change. For a bundt cake, a 10-cup or 12-cup Bundt pan should be fine. You will likely need to increase the baking time by about 30% in the 10-cup pan, somewhat less in the 12-cup. The batter will also fit into a 9-inch by 13-inch pan, but you might need to leave out a bit of the batter so it does not overflow. (I’d also bake the cake on a sheet pan, just in case some batter comes over the sides.)

How do you store the carrot cake? Technically, because there is a cream cheese frosting on the cake, it should be kept in the fridge, but most bakers (even professional ones) are okay with leaving a frosted cake on the counter for a day or two (as long as your kitchen isn’t hot). If you prefer to refrigerate the cake, it will last for 5 to 6 days.

Can I use applesauce instead of oil in the carrot cake recipe? This is something we have never tried ourselves, so you may need to do some experimenting on your own. That said, you should be able to swap some of the oil for applesauce without too many issues.

Can I add pineapple to the carrot cake? Yes, absolutely. It will add even more moisture to the cake so use fresh pineapple or if you are using canned, drain it first before adding to the cake. We do not recommend adding more than 1 cup.

Recipe updated, originally posted April 2014. Since posting this in 2014, we have tweaked the recipe to be more clear and added a quick recipe video. – Adam and Joanne