Soft, fluffy, and moist carrot cake cupcakes! Made completely from scratch with real grated carrots and the option to add nuts or raisins, these cupcakes are always a hit! Make sure to top them off with the absolute best cream cheese frosting.
Carrot Cake Cupcakes will forever be my favorite way to get my daily serving of vegetables. Give me a cupcake and a zucchini muffin for each hand and I’ve got the bottom of the food pyramid covered.
Alright, maybe carrot cake cupcakes aren’t the best way to get your daily vegetables, but it’s definitely the tastiest, especially when topped off with a very generous swirl of cream cheese frosting. They’re soft, moist, and cheerfully fluffy, these cupcakes taste like springtime and sunny weather (which I could really, really use right now!).
These carrot cake cupcakes are a modified version of my favorite carrot cake. The recipe is almost identical to the cake portion except for a bit more liquid in the batter — the original is perfect for cake but I found it to be too dense in the small space of a cupcake liner and added some milk for a bit of levity.
I use all oil in this recipe (no butter) for the moistest (sorry if you hate that word, if you have a better substitute I’m happy to hear it!) cupcakes, and thanks to the spices you’re not missing anything in terms of flavor, I promise! I found that butter just didn’t give these cupcakes the texture that they really needed.
I have a few tips on how to make your own carrot cake cupcakes turn out perfectly, so let’s get into that!
Tips for Making Carrot Cake Cupcakes
- I recommend using the grate setting on your food processor to prepare your carrots, and then briefly pulsing them in your food processor for fine shreds of carrot. I feel like just grating them leaves carrot pieces that are too big, but don’t overdo it when you pulse or you’ll have carrot juice and it will impart way too much carrot flavor into your cupcakes!
- If you don’t have a food processor, you can use a hand grater to grate your carrots.
- While I didn’t use them for my carrot cake cupcakes, you can add walnuts, pecans, or raisins (why, though!) to this recipe, if you’d like. This batter can hold about ½-1 cup of add-ins.
- This recipe can be doubled to make 24 cupcakes.
Enjoy! The full printable recipe is just below the video, make sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel if you enjoy watching these videos!!
How Do You Make Carrot Cake Cupcakes
Carrot Cake Cupcakes
Ingredients
- 1 ¼ cups (157 g) all-purpose flour
- ½ cup (100 g) granulated sugar
- ½ cup (100 g) light brown sugar packed
- ¾ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- ¾ cups (180 ml) canola oil
- 2 large eggs room temperature
- 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2 Tablespoons milk
- 1 ½ cups (170 g) grated carrots
- ½ cup (60 g) chopped walnuts or pecans, optional
- 1 batch Cream Cheese Frosting
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F (175C) and line a 12-count muffin pans with paper liners.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer (or in a large bowl using an electric mixer), whisk together flour, sugars, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg.1 ¼ cups (157 g) all-purpose flour, ½ cup (100 g) granulated sugar, ½ cup (100 g) light brown sugar packed, ¾ teaspoon baking soda, ½ teaspoon baking powder, ½ teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- Stir in canola oil. Add eggs, one at a time, pausing to scrape down sides of the bowl after each addition. Beat until well-combined.¾ cups (180 ml) canola oil, 2 large eggs
- Stir in vanilla extract and milk.1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract, 2 Tablespoons milk
- Add carrots and nuts (if using). and stir until combined.1 ½ cups (170 g) grated carrots, ½ cup (60 g) chopped walnuts or pecans, optional
- Evenly divide batter into cupcake liners, filling each ⅔-¾ of the way full. Transfer to oven and bake on 350F (175C) for 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean or with moist crumbs.
- Allow to cool completely before decorating with cream cheese frosting*.1 batch Cream Cheese Frosting
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information is based on third-party calculations and should be considered an estimate only. Actual nutritional content will vary based upon brands used, measuring methods, cooking method, portion sizes, and more.
Chris
Fantastic recipe! I don’t usually make cupcakes but felt feisty and decided to go for it. I am so glad I did. These cupcakes are amazing. I added golden raisins, walnuts, cloves and ginger powder to the batter for a little more of spicier kick,I am so glad I did, It made the recipe warmer. I also added a little crystallized ginger on top of the cream cheese frosting for decoration. I didn’t have sprinkles. A must try!!! Thank you so much for the recipe.
Ni
hi, would these still be good without the frosting?
Sam
I think they are a great cupcake even without the frosting. 🙂
Puja
Amazing receipe do make it and enjoy
Connie Wick
So awesomely delicious! I followed the recipe and came out perfect! My husband l Ioves carrot cake so I made these cupcakes for his birthday!
Anna
I made your carrot cake for my mom’s birthday and it was amazing! I’m making these for a coworkers baby shower. I can’t wait! I do have a question regarding storing them. I plan on making the cupcakes two days in advance and frosting them the night before. Do they have to be refrigerated once frosted? Thank you so much!
Sam
Hi Anna! If the cupcakes will be consumed within 2 days they will be fine to stay at room temperature, however if it’s really warm where you are, you will want to refrigerate them once frosted. 🙂
laura
I want to make these half the size because I’m making a baby carriage and we don’t need 45 full cupcakes. Should I just half the time?
Sam
Hi Laura! If you are putting less batter the muffin tins you would certainly want to reduce the bake time. This recipe does only make 12 full cupcakes though. 🙂
Tyanca
I am loving that you put the amounts of each ingredient in the directions. Now I don’t have to keep scrolling up and down.😃
erin
Absolutely incredible!!! Thanks so much for this amazing recipe!
Allie
Delicious! These Carrot Cake Cupcakes are the perfect amount of sweetness and flavor. Every bite was very satisfying. (In the frosting, I only used half the amount of powdered sugar, and it was great).
Vicky
I am making this and I do not have any nutmeg. Is it better to leave it out or can I substitute ground ginger instead would it alter the taste of the carrot cake? I love your recipes!
Sam
Hi Vicky! You can omit or use the ginger, whichever you prefer. It’s just going to alter the final flavor a bit. 🙂
Vicky
I went ahead and made these without the cinnamon after I tasted the ginger and figured it wouldn’t be a good fit! Thank you for getting back to me. I don’t know if it’s because I’m in Florida with it humid but I made double the recipe. I’m gonna bake I’m gonna bake! Lol and they freeze well, so I put the first batch in and I pulled them out and even though the toothpick was clean when I opened one up, it was really moist a little more than I would prefer. I usually make carrot cake in a Bundt pan and serve with powdered sugar on the top. So I add more of the carrots to the remaining batter, and I did put a little extra cinnamon in which up the flavor because I didn’t have any nutmeg. The density was not dry, but not as moist as the first batch, so I was happy with the results. Interesting the ones that I added the extra Carrots, they had a higher profile like a high cupcake profile where the ones before were more flat on top? So these are in my list of go to recipes. I have already eaten three of them! Thank you for responding to me!
Summer
This recipe was excellent. I followed the ingredients and directions for combining exactly. I only have a mini muffin tin, and this recipe made 48(!!!) mini cupcakes. (For me they took 16 mins at 350 in the mini pan). I also made the corresponding cream cheese recipe and had leftover of that at the end, which my kids were more than happy to have a heaping spoonful of as a treat. The icing recipe was also excellent and easy!)
Danielle Prescott
Hi I only have butter or soyabean oil.Can I use buttermilk in place of plain milk ?
Sam
Hi Danielle! If all I had on hand was buttermilk, I would give it a shot, but I can’t say for sure how it would turn out.
Linda
I made them and instead of the oil I replaced it with better and it was delicious. I did add 5 min more time in baking them and 17 cupcakes of carrot 🥕 🧁 came out with this batter. Delicious