Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

This year for Easter I wanted to try making a carrot cake. I follow 3 or 4 or more cooking blogger and they ALL posted "The Best" carrot cake ever, and none of them were the same! How annoying! So I found a recipe I thought looked the best and changed it up a bit as usual. It turned out well I though. Charlotte helped me make it and we took it to Grandma Jenny's house for Olivia's birthday dinner. Everyone said it was good- except Charlotte! She didn't like it. I also learned that if you have too much baking soda in your batter, it makes the carrots turn green! They are sensitive to pH. So are blueberries, sunflowers and walnuts. (Do they turn green too??) So next time I make this I will cut down on the amount of baking soda I put in. The recipe this is closest too only had 1 and 1/4 tsp baking powder, so maybe I need to decrease that too. I'm still learning about baking soda vs baking powder and what the different types of baking powder are available. But that's a whole other story! My cake did sink in the middle a little - another sign of too much baking soda!

CAKE:
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda - (Use LESS! or maybe less baking powder?)
1 heaping teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 heaping teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 pound medium carrots, ends trimmed unpeeled - I ended up using 4 carrots
 1 cup sugar
 1 cup packed light brown sugar
 4 large eggs
1 cup oil (I think it should only be 3/4 c! Also a reason the cake might sink in the middle.)
3/4 cup applesauce
Pecans - Optional - I wanted to put some in the cake, but Charlotte said no! Otherwise I think I would have added 1 cup of chopped pecans.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a 9X13 inch baking pan with cooking spray.In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, and salt; set aside. In a food processor fitted with large shredding disk shred the carrots.
In a large bowl beat the granulated sugar, brown sugar, and eggs on medium-high speed until thoroughly combined, about 45 seconds.Reduce the speed to medium and with the mixer running, add oil in a slow, steady stream. Increase the speed to high and mix until the batter is light in color and well emulsified, about 45 seconds to 1 minute longer. Stir in carrots the carrots and dry ingredients by hand until incorporated and no streaks of flour remain (don't over mix).
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake until a toothpick or skewer inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, about 40 minutes.
Let the cakes cool completely before frosting.

CREAM CHEESE FROSTING:
 8 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temperature
 5 tablespoons butter, softened to room temperature
 1 tablespoon sour cream
 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
 1 1/4 cups powdered sugar
 Toasted, chopped pecans, for garnish (optional)

Mix the cream cheese, butter, sour cream, and vanilla in a large bowl with a hand mixer until well combined, about 30 seconds. scraping down sides of the bowl as needed. Add the powdered sugar and mix until very fluffy, about 1-2 minutes. Frost the cake and top with toasted, chopped pecans, if desired.

Adria helped me decorate it. She used a frosting tip to put little dots all over the top of the cake and then added Easter and spring sprinkles to the top. It was very cute - but I didn't get a picture of it.