Vermont Maple Carrot Cake

My sisters and I recently visited my parents. My middle sister, Courtney, brought me some goodies from New England--maple syrup! It reminded me that I have a little cookbook that we purchased when we visited Vermont several years ago. It features recipes that all include maple syrup. I was flipping through it the other day and telling Charles some of the recipes that sounded good. One of which was carrot cake and he asked if I would make it.

Vermont Maple Carrot Cake

Ingredients

Cake
4 eggs
1 cup maple syrup (Dark Amber or B is preferable)
3/4 cup oil
1/2 cup sour cream
1 T lemon juice (I didn't have any, so I used 3 drops of my lemon essential oil)
2 t vanilla
2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups chopped nuts (I used pecans)
1/2 t salt
1 T baking powder
2 t cinnamon
3 cups grated carrots

Cream Cheese Frosting
8oz cream cheese, room temp
1/4 cup butter, room temp
2 t vanilla
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Directions
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Beat eggs on high speed until frothy. Add next 5 ingredients and beat together another minute. Combine flour, nuts, salt, baking powder and cinnamon. Add liquids to dry ingredients. Fold in carrots. Pour into slightly greased bundt pan.

Bake for 1 hour 10 minutes or until a toothpick emerges clean. (I didn't need to bake that long. I could smell that it was done and took it out early. You might want to check it with 30 minutes to go just to make sure). Cool in pan until easy to handle. Frost when cool with cream cheese frosting.

To make frosting, cream together cream cheese and butter with mixer on high. Add vanilla and beat until combined. Add powdered sugar and beat until you have your desired consistency.

Creamsicle Cake for the troops

Now that I am not working, I am able to do some volunteer things that I did not have time or make time for previously. One such occasion was simply to bake a cake and hang out with some Airmen. My husband's squadron will have "crew feeds" from time to time. These are often organized by the spouses. The most recent one included a contest for best dish and was called Crocks for Crews. Everyone could sign up to bring a crockpot meal or a dessert. I chose dessert since I am not confident enough in my cooking ability to force other people to eat my savory dishes. I thought and thought about what dessert to make. There are soooo many great options! I had recently ordered some essential oils including a tangerine essential oil. I thought it would be fun to make something with it. So I decided on a creamsicle cake. It turned out to be delicious! I'm going to have to make it again sometime soon.

The cake is just a basic vanilla cake, made from scratch using a recipe from the blog I Am Baker. Of course I found it on Pinterest. This recipe is neat because you can mix the dry ingredients together ahead of time and store in a mason jar or another container. Then when you are ready for some cake, you just add a few extra ingredients and bake.

The frosting is my favorite Betty Crocker vanilla buttercream with a few drops of tangerine essential oil.

Creamsicle Cake

Ingredients for cake
2 1/4 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 1/2 t baking powder
1 t salt
1 1/4 cups milk
2 T vegetable oil
1 stick butter, softened
1 T vanilla
3 large eggs

Ingredients for frosting
3 cups powdered sugar
1/3 cup butter, softened
3 drops of tangerine essential oil (orange essential oil would also work)
1 1/2 t vanilla
1  to 2 T milk

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place softened butter in bowl and mix on medium for 1 to 2 minutes.

Place dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder, salt) in bowl with butter and combine for 30 seconds.

Add milk, oil, vanilla, and eggs and mix on medium-high for one minute.

Pour batter into prepared pans and bake. For 9 inch pans, bake for 20-25 minutes. For cupcakes, start checking around 15 minutes. (I used a 13x9 inch pan and had to bake for longer than 25 minutes... I can't remember the exact time, but I did it in small increments and checked using my cake tester). Cool before frosting.

To make frosting, mix powdered sugar and butter in bowl with mixer on low speed. Stir in essential oil, vanilla and milk (starting with 1 tablespoon and adding more, as needed). I usually have to add more than 2 tablespoons of milk for the right consistency.

Thanksgiving dessert: German Apple Cake

As I mentioned in my Thanksgiving entry, I made a couple desserts to accompany the sweet potato pie that came with our meal. Usually I make Caramel Apple Pecan Pie for this holiday, but I wanted to make something different. For our Oktoberfest party I made an apple cake that was AMAZING! I knew it would be a hit at Thanksgiving, too. Of course, I found the recipe on Pinterest. To see the original recipe, click here.

German Apple Cake

Ingredients
2 large eggs
1 cup vegetable oil
1 3/4 cup white sugar
1 t vanilla
2 cups flour
2 t cinnamon
1 t salt
1 t baking soda
4 cups thinly peeled and sliced apples (Granny Smith are my favorite)

Frosting
1 8oz pkg cream cheese
3 T melted butter
1 t vanilla
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

*Since my husband does not like cream cheese, I just made regular vanilla frosting from the Betty Crocker Big Red cookbook

Directions
Preheat over to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x13 baking dish.
Add oil to eggs in mixer and beat until foamy. Add the sugar and vanilla; mix. Add the flour, cinnamon, salt and baking soda. Mix together. Add apples by folding in with a spoon. The batter will be very thick. It seems like there are more apples than batter. This is normal.
Bake for 50 to 60 minutes.

Make frosting. If following recipe for cream cheese frosting, she said add a little milk if it's too thick.