Carrot Pineapple Cake with Orange Cream Cheese Frosting

Carrot Cake Recipe – moist and delicious, this cake is topped with a scrumptious orange cream cheese frosting. Every bite is melt in your mouth delicious!

This carrot cake is loaded with pineapple, coconut, and nuts. You can leave out the coconut and nuts, or you can make my Carrot Cake Cupcakes that are more simple, but still amazing.

I’m not sure why it is, but carrot cake just seems to go with Easter. I guess it’s because carrots remind us of bunnies. Or something like that. I don’t know, but that’s okay, I’ll eat this cake for Easter even if it makes no sense at all. Because it is dang good stuff!

This is the basic carrot cake recipe that I grew up with. Over the years, I’ve experimented with adding pineapple, nuts, and coconut. You can add or omit any of them and the cake is always delicious. And oh so moist.

This time my experiment was with the frosting. I added some orange zest just to see what it would taste like. Oh my. I am in trouble. It was killer! So yummy that I wanted to just sit and eat it out of the bowl. But I restrained myself. Mostly because we had family over and they were all watching me. 😉

Seriously though, I thought it was a fabulous addition. Everyone else loved it too. Some even came back for thirds.  I don’t remember the last time I enjoyed a piece of carrot cake so much. And I’ve had a lot of great carrot cake. I will always be adding the orange to the frosting from now on!

How to make Carrot Cake with Orange Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:

• vegetable oil
• sugar
• eggs
• vanilla
• grated carrots
• crushed pineapple
• flour
• baking powder
• baking soda
• salt
• cinnamon
• pecans
• coconut
• cream cheese
• orange zest
• powdered sugar
• milk

Whisk together oil, sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Stir in carrots and pineapple. Stir in dry ingredients. Fold in nuts and coconut if desired. Pour into a greased 9×13″ pan.

Bake at 350 for about 50-60 minutes. Cool completely, then spread frosting on top.

Oh man. I kid you not – this carrot pineapple cake is incredible! Nothing fancy, just good old fashioned deliciousness.

How to store carrot cake:

Leftovers are good for a day or two at room temperature covered tightly with plastic wrap. If you want to keep the cake longer than that, store it in the refrigerator. Before serving, let it come to room temperature so the frosting will soften up.

COOK’S TOOLS FOR MAKING CARROT CAKE:

• Food Processor – there’s a lot of carrots to grate, so a food processor is very handy!
• Grater– if you don’t have a food processor, you’re going to need a hand grater.
• Whisk – all you need to mix up the batter is a whisk, no hand mixer required.
• Serving spatula– I have several of these, and they are so handy!

More cake recipes to try:

• White Chocolate Raspberry Bundt Cake
• Super Easy Pineapple Cake with Broiled Icing
• Lemon Pound Cake
• Banana Pudding Cake
• Pound Cake Recipe (easy)
• Quinoa Cake
• Peanut Butter Sheet Cake
• Flourless Chocolate Cake Recipe
• Grasshopper Cake

Carrot Cake

Carrot Cake topped with a scrumptious orange cream cheese frosting.

4.80 from 15 votes

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 55 minutes mins

Additional Time 2 hours hrs

Total Time 3 hours hrs 15 minutes mins

Course Dessert: Cakes and Cupcakes

Cuisine American

Servings 15 servings

Calories 494 kcal

Ingredients

  

1x2x3x

Cake

• 1 ¼ cups vegetable oil
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 3 cups grated carrots
• 8 oz crushed pineapple drained
• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp cinnamon

Orange Cream Cheese Frosting

• 4 oz cream cheese
• ¼ cup butter
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp orange zest
• 2 ½ cups powdered sugar
• 1 tsp milk if needed (or more)

Instructions

 

• -Whisk together oil, sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Stir in carrots and pineapple. Stir in dry ingredients. Pour into a greased 9×13″ pan. Bake at 350 for about 50-60 minutes. Cool and frost.
• -Soften cream cheese and butter. Beat till smooth. Add the vanilla and orange zest. Beat in the powdered sugar till you get the consistency you like. You can add milk if you need to.

Notes

• This cake is also fantastic with a cup of chopped pecans and a cup of shredded coconut added to the batter.

Nutrition

Serving: 1gCalories: 494kcalCarbohydrates: 65gProtein: 4gFat: 25gSaturated Fat: 7gPolyunsaturated Fat: 11gMonounsaturated Fat: 6gTrans Fat: 0.3gCholesterol: 59mgSodium: 368mgPotassium: 149mgFiber: 2gSugar: 50gVitamin A: 4546IUVitamin C: 3mgCalcium: 63mgIron: 1mg

Keyword carrot cake

Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!