Best easy carrot cake cupcakes + cream cheese frosting

If you like carrot cake then you'll love this carrot cake cupcake recipe. They give you a much better ratio of cake to fluffy cream cheese frosting.

Jump to:

• Ingredients
• FAQs
• Storage
• Recipe
• Recipe

I know, I know, calling a post ‘the best ever carrot cupcakes’ is a big call. 

I said it for The Best Ever Chocolate Mud Cake and so far everyone who has tried it has agreed so you’ll just have to make these and tell me what you think.

For my beautiful grey and yellow baby shower before our first baby, my only job was making mini carrot cupcakes with yellow icing. 

Mum was very specific in her directions.

I really wanted grey and white cupcake cases to go with the yellow icing but try as I might I could not find them anywhere. 

I ended up ordering some from eBay which claimed to be grey but when they arrived they were more of a charcoal-black.

It was back to the drawing board where I decided to make little toppers and use white cases instead. 

Ingredients

CUPCAKES

• Raw sugar - many carrot cake recipes use brown sugar but stick with raw here (trust us!)
• Olive oil - you can use other oils here but avoid vegetable oil 
• Eggs - at room temperature
• Plain wholemeal flour - or spelt flour or wholemeal all purpose flour
• Bicarbonate of soda - also known as bicarb soda or baking soda
• Baking powder
• Cinnamon - ground cinnamon powder (you can add other warm spices like ginger or cardamom for extra flavour)
• Salt - our favourite is Celtic Sea Salt
• Grated carrot - alternatively you can use any combination of coconut, mango, mashed banana or pineapple to equal the two cups (I used 1 banana and the rest carrot)
• Chopped walnuts

Why does carrot cake use oil instead of butter

Oil gives carrot cakes their signature moisture (along with the carrot).

The wholemeal flour in carrot cakes soaks it in making them nice and moist. 

How finely should I grate the carrots?

The key to a fluffy, moist carrot cake cupcakes is super finely grated carrots. 

Grate them as finely as you can. A box grater is perfect for this (with a bit of elbow grease). 

ICING - aka our favorite cream cheese frosting

• Cream cheese
• Icing sugar - also called confectioner's sugar or powdered sugar. Here's how to make your own icing sugar. 
• Butter - pure butter not margarine
• Vanilla extract - here's how to make your own vanilla extract

Can I use heavy cream instead of cream cheese?

For classic cream cheese frosting, you'll need to use cream cheese. 

Using heavy cream won't give it the distinct tangy flavour. 

Sour cream would be the closes substitute but we would still recommend cream cheese. 

Anyway back to the cupcakes. 

When my grandma heard I was tasked with carrot cupcakes she said ‘you’re making your mother’s recipe aren’t you, it’s the best?’ 

Now who am I to go against something like that especially coming from my Grandma.

She was the absolute Queen of baked goods judging.

I’m not sure where Mum’s recipe originated from but it is in my folder of recipes Mum typed for me when I went off to Canada for 3 months nearly 20 years ago and she has been making it forever.

The base recipe is carrot but where it calls for 2 cups of grated carrot, you can substitute some crushed pineapple, coconut, mango or mashed banana or any combination. 

Can you guess which one I went with? 

Yes you’re right I added a little mashed banana.

The result is a moist but still light and fluffy little cake that will have you hiding the wrapper so you can sneak another one. 

It can be made up as a cake (cook it for about 40 minutes) but I think bite-sized cupcake form is even better. 

It really is the best carrot cake cupcake recipe. 

FAQs

Storage

It’s best to refrigerate carrot cake with cream cheese frosting especially in warmer weather. 

It will keep for 5 to 7 days in an airtight container. 

Does carrot cake get better the next day?

It does indeed. 

If you have time, make it a day ahead of when you want to serve it and store it in an airtight container in the fridge. 

So will you give them a go and see if they live up to their name? 

Don’t forget the cream cheese icing though – it’s the, well, the icing on the cake!

Happy baking! 

Looking for a delicious carrot cake recipe to make it a little bigger? Try our simple carrot cake.

Recipe

Recipe