Carrot Cake

One of my team members loves carrot cake.  I always joke with him when he spends almost $3 to buy a slice of carrot cake from the coffee shop downstairs of the office.  He's a Muslim and he had to do fasting for one month recently.  I promised him that I would bake a carrot cake for him when his fasting was over.  This is a 9" x 13" cake. I was hoping others in the office could enjoy it too.  When I asked him to bring some back for his wife, he actually cut quite a big piece.  I could tell how much he liked carrot cake.  This recipe was taken from Allrecipes.com.  There were almost 80,000  people saved the recipe and more than 2,800 people gave high rating on it.  Can't go wrong with that.  It was indeed very easy and very tasty.  I also replaced half of the oil with apple sauce and reduced the sugar in icing from 4 cups to less than 1.5 cups.  They're perfect match.  Many coworkers at the office emailed me to thank me for making this delicious cake.

Here's my adaptation of the recipe:

Ingredients

• 4 eggs
• 3/4 cups vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup applesauce
• 1 1/2 cups white sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 3 cups finely grated carrots
• 1 cup chopped pecans

  Icing

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
•  14 ounces cream cheese, softened
•  1 1/2cups confectioners' sugar
•  2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup chopped pecans

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9x13 inch pan.
2. In a large bowl, beat together eggs, oil, applesauce, white sugar and 2 teaspoons vanilla. Mix in flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Stir in carrots. Fold in pecans. Pour into prepared pan.
3. Bake in the preheated oven for 40 to 50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely.
4. To Make Frosting: In a medium bowl, combine butter, cream cheese, confectioners' sugar and vanilla. Beat until the mixture is smooth and creamy. Stir in chopped pecans. Frost the cooled cake.