Cakelettes

We had such a great time catching up with our good friends the Mejias last night. I busted out our prize-winning Brie en Croute recipe and without fail- it won them over as well. Also tried out a recipe for "Carrot Cakelettes" from an adorable book my sister gave us for Christmas. So cute and delicious I had to share. One of the best carrot cake recipes I have found so far, and the fact they are called 'cakelettes' make them all the more darling! The recipe is for 6 personal-sized cakes, and I doubled the recipe and had enough for left overs and take-homes.

Carrot Cakelettes with Lemon Icing

adapted from "The Two of Us.. and Friends", by Jessie Carry Saunders

Little Cakes:

2 medium carrots, peeled & cut into large pieces

1/2 c canned crushed pineapple with juice

1/4 c flour

pinch of salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

pinch of nutmeg

pinch of cloves

1/4c vegetable oil

1/4 c brown sugar, packed

1/4 granulated sugar*

1 egg

1/4 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 c chopped toasted pecans

1/4 chopped raw walnuts

1/4 c golden raisins

1/4 c chopped candied ginger

Icing:

4 oz cream cheese, room temp

zest & juice of 2 lemons

1 Tbsp heavy cream**

2/3 c powdered sugar

* I did not add all the granulated sugar.

** I used a lower-fat variety of milk. I think any sort (even skim) would work.

Preheat oven to 350.

Heat 2 c water in small saucepan. When boiling, drop in carrots. Cook over moderate heat, covered, until carrots are very tender, about 15 minutes. Drain.

Put carrots and crushed pineapple with juice in a blender and give mixture a good whiz- until uniform and gloopy.

Lay out large piece of waxed paper and grab your flour sifter. Sift the flour together with the salt, baking soda, and spices onto the waxed paper. Set aside.

In a large bowl, mix carrot puree with oil, brown sugar, granulated sugar, and egg, until smooth. Add the flour mixture all at once and stir with a wooden spoon until just mixed. Then fold in the remaining cakelette ingredients. The batter should be nice and lumpy with all the goodies you have just added.

Spray muffin cups with non stick spray & flour (or line muffin pan with cupcake liners). Fill each cup 1/2 full with batter and give the whole pan a good rap on the kitchen counter to rid cakelettes of any air bubbles. Bake for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the middle of a cakelette comes out clean.

While cakes are baking, make the icing: In a small bowl, smush the cream cheese around with a rubber spatula to loosen it up. Then add the lemon juice and cream, mixing until uniform. Finally- add the powdered sugar and mix thoroughly. The icing should be thick but still pourable.

When cakes are done, turn them out onto a cooling rack. The bottom of each cupcake is the top of your cakelette (unless you used liners, in which you will not invert). After cool, ice cakelettes- if you turned them upside-down, let the icing drip down the sides. Then let them chill out in the fridge for at least an hour before serving.