Carrot Cake Loaf – An incredibly moist and delicious carrot cake loaf that is packed full of flavour, loaded with grated carrot, and topped with a thick cream cheese frosting!
Carrot Cake Loaf
If you love carrot cake just as much as I do, then you’ll love today’s recipe. I have a few carrot cake recipes on my blog already.
See these Blondies (one of my faves), Carrot Layer Cake, and my Cheesecake Swirl Carrot Bundt Cake. I recommend all of them. 🙂
But today, I have a new favourite – Carrot Cake Loaf!
Ingredients you’ll need
Here’s a list of ingredients you’ll need to make this loaf. You can find my recipe card at the bottom of this post for the complete list with their amounts.
- plain/all-purpose flour
- caster/granulated sugar
- baking powder
- baking soda
- salt
- ground cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves
- eggs
- vanilla extract
- vegetable oil
- greek-style yogurt
- carrots – you’ll need 2 large ones
For the frosting, you’ll need:
- cream cheese
- unsalted butter
- icing/powdered sugar
- vanilla extract
That’s it. Simple, delicious ingredients!
How to make Carrot Cake Loaf
To make this carrot loaf, simply whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and spices. Set aside.
In another bowl, whisk together the eggs, vanilla, vegetable oil, and yogurt. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, and mix until just combined.
Fold in the grated carrots. Do not over-mix. The batter will be VERY thick. Spoon the batter into a greased 9×5-inch loaf pan and spread out evenly.
Bake for 50 – 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cover loosely with aluminium foil halfway through baking to prevent the cake from browning too much.
Leave to cool completely in the pan on a wire rack before frosting.
For the frosting, beat together the cream cheese and butter until smooth and creamy. Add the icing sugar and vanilla, and beat until smooth and spreadable.
Spread the frosting over the cooled loaf, top with walnuts or pecans if desired, then slice and serve!
The printable recipe card with the full list of ingredients, their measurements, and instructions can be found at the bottom of this post.
NOTE: For best results, I highly recommend using the gram measurements (with a digital scale), rather than the cup measurements. Cup measurements are simply not accurate enough, and I cannot guarantee the best results if you use them.
This Carrot Cake Loaf is:
- incredibly moist, and a mix between fluffy and dense
- packed full of flavour from warming spices
- stuffed FULL of grated carrots, not one bite without them!
- topped with a thick and sweet cream cheese frosting
I like to pretend this carrot loaf recipe is somewhat good for me, and have a slice for breakfast. 😉
Seriously though, this cake loaf is good even without the frosting, a slice warmed up in the microwave – divine paired with a cuppa tea or coffee!
Store the rest away in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 5 days, or freeze for up to 3 months.
BEST carrot cake bread recipe I’ve ever had. I hope you get to try it!
Did You Make This Recipe?
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Carrot Cake Loaf
Ingredients
For the Cake
- 3 cups (375g) plain/all-purpose flour
- ¾ cup (150g) caster/granulated sugar
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ⅓ cup (80ml) vegetable oil
- 1 cup (240g) Greek-style yogurt
- 2 large carrots, (about 8oz / 250g), grated
For the Frosting
- ½ cup (115g) cream cheese, softened
- ¼ cup (56g) unsalted butter, softened
- 2 cups (250g) icing/powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
For the Cake
- Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Grease and line an 9×5-inch loaf pan with parchment paper. Set aside.
- Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and spices. Set aside.
- Mix together the eggs, vanilla, vegetable oil, and yogurt. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, and mix until just combined.
- Fold in the grated carrots. Do not over-mix. The batter will be VERY thick. Spoon the batter into the prepared pan and spread out evenly.
- Bake for 50 – 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cover loosely with aluminium foil halfway through baking to prevent the cake from browning too much.
- Leave to cool completely in the pan on a wire rack.
For the Frosting
- Using a handheld or stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat together the cream cheese and butter until smooth and creamy. Add the icing sugar and vanilla, and beat until smooth and spreadable.
- Spread the frosting over the cooled loaf, top with walnuts or pecans (optional), then slice and serve.
Recipe Notes
Nutrition Information:
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I *really* wish I read the comments before I started baking. This loaf is a brick. Tastes great, texture is awful. Marsha girl, we really can’t afford to waste any ingredients in a Pandemic! How did this get such a high rating?
Hi Lucy! When it comes to my recipes, I do supply both US and UK measurements to my readers for convenience. But I always, always recommend weighing your ingredients out instead of using cups (if you aren’t already doing so). It is more accurate, especially when it comes to ingredients like flour.
This loaf is quite a thick batter that needs to be spooned into the pan, but the end result should be a dense but moist cake.
So I just got done making this! Definitely not as great as I hoped. It was WAY too dense, not as moist as I hoped. There was also WAY too much icing, wasted half of it. Won’t make again.
Came out perfectly. Baked it for 20 minutes longer and added milk nuts and raisins to the mix.
Loved the recipe! Perfect with the yogurt, but for future reference, any vegan alternatives you suggest?
HI marsha; back in the mid 60’s my mom a young woman then plcked up a recipe in one of the home magazines of the day for carrot cake. The recipe started with 2lb of carrots and ended with sherry.
In recent years my daughter has been baking it for her (us)as it is her favorite. My daughter recently relocated and the recipe has gotten lost. This recipe sounds very close to that one except we can’t figure out the amount of the ingredients for 2lbs of carrot Also her recipe didn’t include yogurt. We’re hoping you can find the time to help us as mom’s in her 80’s now and is really looking forward to it this Thanksgiving. Tradition. We are kinda desperate as you can guess to be bothering you.By the way, Her batter was very thick also. The recipe here sounds delicious . Thanks and sorry to bother you
CHEEKY CARROT CAKE
https://www.nigella.com/recipes/members/konstant-kravers-cheeky-carrot-cake
Made it already. My batter wasn’t thick at all, it was very nice. I’ve added an extra egg, because my ones seemed too small to be called large and I’ve grated the carrots on the small grater.That way they stayed very fine and moist. I’m sure the cake will be perfect. Gotta put some elbow grease into grating those carrots and grate it into very fine fluff.
Let me know how it turns out, Marta – enjoy! 🙂
Thank you Marsha for adding the grams of those carrots. Gonna make this loaf tonight.
I made this with the initial recipe, but also had to add 1/2 cup of milk to the batter. I also added 1/2 cup each of raisins and walnuts. I decreased the sugar to 2/3 of a cup for the batter and used only one cup of powdered sugar for the frosting (I decrease the amount of sugar in every recipe.) It was good but too dry. I made it again but used only 2 cups of flour and what a difference! No need to add milk Moist and delish! Thanks for the recipe!
I made this last night and in view of previous comments I added some extra milk. I found the carrots quite difficult to fold in as the mixture was so thick, so I think I would add them to the other wet ingredients next time. I also added a few raisins and nuts. Tasted good! Thank you
I’m so glad you enjoyed it! 🙂
Easy and so delicious!!!
I added a splash of milk to the mixture after reading the other comments.
Will def make this again!!
I’m so glad you enjoyed it! 🙂
Hello from Paris,
I just baked and tasted this carrot cake loaf… simply perfect! Thank you!
Hi Eva! I’m so glad you enjoyed it! 🙂
I made this last night and could not stop eating it. So so so good. Bravo! Awesome space too!
Thanks! I’m so glad you enjoyed it! 🙂
I made this carrot cake loaf the other day. My batter could not be poured – it had the consistency of play dough. I added 1/2 cup of almond milk, which helped. I still felt that the loaf was a little dry. The carrot cake loaf has a very nice flavor and the frosting helps with the dryness. I wonder if something was left out of the original recipe?
The batter is very thick and doesn’t “pour” into the pan, you need to scrape/spoon it in. Although very thick, I found the loaf moist, and is lovely warmed up 🙂
I had the same experience making this tonight. I checked the ingredients list three times to make sure I hadn’t missed a liquid.
The batter was actually extremely difficult to work with, too, as it was very sticky. With the final baked loaf, the pieces toward the ends are quite dry while the middle barely finished cooking. Overall very dense, too. Tastes decent, but I’m pretty disappointed.
The batter is quite thick, which makes the loaf dense.
To avoid overbaking the top before the middle is done, cover loosely with aluminium foil halfway through baking. I mention this in step 4. Also, I always recommend using an oven thermometer, as not all ovens are correct and can be way off.
I do hope you give it another try 🙂
I could not picture a more picture-perfect loaf!! Hehe. Every single photo is making me drool ever so attractively, Marsha! 😉 Love that there are variations of this recipe, and looking forward to seeing more. Happy Wednesday, Marsha!
Thanks, Demeter! 🙂 xo
I enjoyed this cake loaf very much but with 2 revisions:
1) batter was very thick and hard to work with so i added just a little bit more oil or a bit less flour will also help next time.
2) cut sugar in half when making frosting and it was perfect for my taste.
The end result was delicious! Will make again 🙂 Thank you!
This carrot cake bread sounds so yummy!! Pinning!!