Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

To celebrate some co-worker anniversaries I made a carrot cake. I'd never made one before, but the recipe I found seemed simple enough, and it turned out awesome! (my co-workers can vouche for me)

This cake was moist, just sweet enough, and had lots of lovely bright orange carroty bits. so pretty! Plus I went all organic with my ingredients, and I'm certain that makes a big difference.

The recipe can be made in two 9" layer cake pans or one large bunt cake. (I only had one 9" pan, so i made one at a time. it was a great time to read while i waited)

Ingredients:
cake:
2 cups sugar
2 cups all-purpose unbleached flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
4 eggs
3 cups grated carrots
1 cup chopped walnuts

icing:
1 (3 ounce) package cream cheese
1/4 half and half
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups sifted confectioners' sugar

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease one 9 or 10 inch tube pan.

2. Combine the sugar, flour, salt, cinnamon and soda. With a whisk mix these dry ingredients together to breakup clumps, then stir in the vegetable oil.

3. With an electric mixer or by hand beat in the eggs one at a time. Then stir in the grated carrots and walnuts. Pour the batter into the prepared baking pan(s).

4. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 1 hour 20 minutes. Check periodically to make sure its doing ok. near the end stick a toothpick in the middle to see if it comes out clean. If there's still batter on the toothpick leave it in for a while longer. if the toothpick comes out clean, you're ready to go.

5. To Make Frosting: With an electric mixer, or by hand with a spoon or whisk, blend the cream cheese and half and half. Add the vanilla and confectioners' sugar. Frosting can be spread on a still warm cake.

(For my icing I used Dr. Oetkers Organic Vanilla Icing, which you can find at most health food stores. Instead of butter I used organic cream cheese, and instead of milk I used organic half and half. In the end I used more cream cheese than was called for, because it tasted sooo good, and i liked how the icing wasnt overly sweet.)