Delicious gluten-free carrot cake cupcakes for a delightful treat

Think classic carrot cake with all natural and alternative ingredients and jam packed with flavor. This is live baking and these are my carrot cake cupcakes. Bigger Bolder Baking is all about giving you the confidence to bake anytime, anywhere. My live baking recipes are going to show you how to use alternative ingredients to make dessert your way. Think about dessert customized. All carrot cake cupcakes start out with a batter. So we're going to be making a cake batter with some almond flour, a little bit of coconut flour. Next up, we got our raising agent. It's going to make everything nice and fluffy. And now, let's talk about our spices. You cannot have carrot cake without a little bit of spice. I've got a mix of cinnamon and ginger here. So we're gonna go right in with that. And if you don't have ginger or you don't like it quite as spicy, feel free to use all cinnamon in this case. Last but not least, salt is going to balance out all the sweetness from the carrot and the raisins. So now we're gonna give this a good whisk. Almond flour is actually just almonds that have been ground into a fine powder, and same goes for coconut flour. So I really like to use these in place of a wheat-based flour because they provide a lot of moisture, they're a good source of healthy fat, and they also have added fiber. If you see some lumps here and there in your almond flour, that's totally normal. Just go ahead and work those out. So this is going to be the base of the dry ingredients for our batter. Now we're going to move on to the wet ingredients. We're going to start out in this nice big jug. Gem always mixes her wet ingredients in a jug and I love to do it this way too because it just keeps everything in one place, makes it nice and clean and you can really see that you have the right ratios. So first up is coconut oil. Feel free to use butter or ghee in this case if you prefer. And then to that we're going to go in with two eggs. If you don't eat eggs or you're allergic to them. You could absolutely replace these with a flax egg. That would actually make these cupcakes entirely vegan. So the next thing that's gonna go into our wet ingredients is a little bit of vanilla. And last but not least, the final thing going into our wet ingredients is our maple syrup. This is actually a sugar-free maple syrup that is based in monk fruit. But if you wanna use regular maple syrup or honey, those work really well too. And now we're just going to give this a nice whisk and make sure that the eggs are completely combined with the oil and the maple syrup. So just like making any other cake batter, now we're going to add our wet ingredients into our dry. So we're just going to give this a good whisk and make sure that everything is evenly combined. You will see that the batter gets really nice and thick. That's actually the coconut flour absorbing all the liquid and you'll see it's a nice like golden color from the cinnamon. It even smells cinnamony already. So I'm sure you're all wondering where's the carrot cake, right? So We are going to add in loads of freshly grated carrots. So do not be tempted to buy pre-grated carrot. You really want to grate your own here. I grate my carrot on a cheese grater, but feel free to do it in a food processor or any way that works for you. We're going to begin to fold in our carrots. I don't know if you can tell, but the ratio of carrot to cake is about 50-50, and that's how you know this is going to be full of carrot-y flavor. It's going to be super moist. It's going to have that earthy bit from the carrot, and then the cinnamon, which is really going to spice it up, and now our extra fun stuff. So this is flaked coconut. Make sure to use unsweetened coconut. And raisins. So let's talk about raisins. Some people don't like dried fruit. Some people like their carrot cake more with like a tropical vibe. They put pineapple in there. This is an opportunity to really get creative. If you don't like raisins, but you like golden raisins, by all means, add that in there. As long as you got the carrot and you keep the ratios of the other mix-ins the same, you can pretty much do whatever you like. Now, we're going to turn this carrot cake batter into carrot cake cupcakes. I'm going to scoop out some of the batter. Look how thick that is and just full of all the goodies. I'm doing it about two-thirds of the way full. So now that our cupcakes are all full, we're going to bake these off. They're going to bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit, which is 180 degrees Celsius, for about 20 to 30 minutes. And you're going to see they're going to puff up and get really nice and golden brown. Now we're going to get started on our sneaky no cream cheese frosting. Thanks to a little bit of really thick Greek yogurt, we are going to get that nice tangy flavor that you get with a cream cheese frosting. Next up, we're gonna do some coconut cream. This is coconut cream that is nice and cold, which is super important. That's gonna help everything whip up and make our frosting nice and thick and stiff. And now a little bit of vanilla going in. Last but not least, this is our sugar substitute. This is, again, a monk fruit-based substitute, but you can totally use regular sugar. You could use Swerve. You could use a couple drops of Stevia. We're going to hit this with our hand mixer. If you have a stand mixer, you can absolutely use that as well. Since the coconut cream is nice and cold, it's gonna take a little bit to work out, so just keep going, give it a good mix, and the frosting will be done when it's nice and rich and creamy. Check that out. So the last thing that we're going to do is we're gonna give it a little taste. Mm, oh, it's so good. What we're really looking for here is that the sugar has fully dissolved. Now it's time for the best part. I'm gonna show you how to decorate our cupcakes. When your cupcakes are done they're going to be nice and golden brown so we're going to set these aside to cool completely. What you might not know is that at Bigger Bolder Baking we take a lot of time and put a lot of care into styling our finished desserts. In the case of these carrot cake cupcakes I'm going to be decorating them on this really really pretty and springy cake stand and I'm going to bring in a nice brightly Brightly colored cloth. We're just going to transfer our cupcakes to our cupcake stand so now I'm going to grab a spoon. One of my favorite things about this frosting besides the way it tastes is that you don't have to pipe it it's really you can just see how nice and thick it is so we're just going to dollop nice generous amounts of frosting on top of our cupcakes. We're going to go back with our butter knife and we're going to just swirl the frosting on top. What I'm looking for here is a nice little peak. I mean, those are carrot cake cupcakes. So in the case of these cupcakes, what we're gonna do is we're gonna add some toasted coconut. And I'm gonna just do half. of each cupcake. I like when things have a little bit of a graphic touch to them. So I think you got the nice, bright, white frosting and the orange of the cupcake peeking out from underneath and then just that little half moon shape of the coconut I think really just pops it out. To complete our scene, I'm going to add in this vase with some fresh flowers. I love to use flowers and greenery in my photography. I think it adds a really nice bright pop. And look at this. Look at how inviting and springy this is. Just going to slice right in. Look at those raisins popping out and the carrot. You can see all the texture from the coconut and that oozy frosting. I love carrot cake so I could not be more excited to try these. Honestly, the smell has been taunting me the entire time we've been putting together our scene so it's time to go in for our taste, shall we? Hands down, probably one of the best carrot cakes I've made. It's just perfectly balanced, that's why I love carrot cake. It's got earthy carrot and then cinnamon and then something about the cream cheesiness of the frosting which I have to pat myself on the back there because there's no cream cheese. But it tastes just like the real thing. These are the quintessential carrot cake cupcakes, but they're made your way. The recipes on BiggerBolderBaking.com. I cannot wait to hear what you guys think.