Carrot Cake Cookies: The World’s Best Vehicle for Cream Cheese Icing
Ahhh, dessert, I love it when you are flavored like other desserts…..
I know, empirically, that carrot cake doesn’t count as a serving of vegetables. Or that an incredibly huge slice doesn’t count as two servings of vegetables. I think we all do.
Yet I still have a vague sense that it’s somehow wholesome and good for me, even though my best recipe for carrot cake calls for a whole cup of mayonnaise. A wholesome, somehow good-for-me-excuse to eat frosting in front of company, because it seems bad manners to shovel it in my mouth with a spoon.
As I’ve mentioned before, I am honor bound to bake things for the PTA on occasion and was recently invited to whip up a treat. For a bake sale. For a fundraiser. With a Wild West theme.
I am not sure how or why I instantly associated “wild, wild west” with “carrot cake,” but that’s what happened. Maybe because carrot sticks are good with ranch dressing and ranches are western-ish? Either way, the end result was tasty.
I chose to make a chewy oatmeal type cookie by beating together butter and brown sugar and freshly grated ginger until light and fluffy, then add some vanilla extract and egg.
This mixture was joined by another mixture of flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg and mixed well.
The oats and add-ins (freshly grated carrot, shredded coconut, and chopped walnut) were stirred in after to form the dough.
The dough was spooned onto a parchment lined cookie sheet and baked at 350º for 12 minutes. I thought crispy cookies would be at odds with the carrot cake-y experience I was trying to encapsulate, so I started checking for doneness after about 10 minutes. But I get some strange anxieties when it comes to volunteer baking.
The cookies came out of the oven and went onto the rack to cool all the way down to room temperature.
I would like to say I made my own amazing cream cheese icing from scratch to fill the cookies and that there was a parade because of my James Beard Award-winning icing, but I actually just used a store brand can.
I went the zip-top baggie piping route, put a few heaping dollops of the store can icing in the bag and snipped off a small corner, squeezing about a teaspoon and a half of the creamy stuff onto the back of one cookie before gently pressing another cookie on top.
I had to put the test batch out of sight in the fridge so I wouldn’t eat all of it. And like the fine spice cake, they’re meant to invoke, these sandwich cookies are extra delicious after an overnight.
| Prep Time | 15 min |
| Cook Time | 15 min |
| Servings |
cookies
|
- 1/2 cup Butter room temp
- 1 cup Light Brown Sugar packed
- 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1 Egg
- 1 1/2 cup Oats
- 3/4 cup Flour
- 1/4 tsp Baking Soda
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 3/4 tsp Cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp Allspice
- 1/8 tsp Nutmeg
- 1 tbsp Fresh Ginger Grated
- 2 medium Carrots Grated (approx. 2/3 cups)
- 1/3 cup Coconut Shredded (optional)
- 1/4 cup Walnut Chopped (optional)
- Cream Cheese Frosting (for filling)
Ingredients
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|
- Beat together Butter and Sugar until light and fluffy
- Add in Vanilla, Ginger, and Egg, beating after each addition to incorporate
- In a separate bowl, whisk together Flour, Soda, Salt and dried Spices
- Add Flour Mixture to Butter-Sugar mixture and beat again
- Stir in Oats, Shredded Carrot, Coconut and Walnut
- Drop by rounded spoonful onto cookie sheets and bake at 350f for 12-15 minutes
- Allow to cool to room temperature on rack
- Fill a piping bag with cream cheese frosting and pipe about a tsp onto the bottom of one cookie and lightly press on a second cookie, repeating with remaining cookies until all are done
*If you like raisins or other dried fruit in your carrot cake, feel free to add some! I didn't on account of personal preference.
ITEMS WE USED TO MAKE THIS RECIPE
