One-Bowl Carrot Cake Muffins

Carrot cake is a classic that is good all year round. Your classic carrot cake is a dense, moist layer cake that is stacked high with rounds of cake and swirls of cream cheese frosting. These One-Bowl Carrot Cake Muffins are a twist on this favorite that is better for brunch than dessert. These muffins capture all the warm, spicy flavors of a traditional carrot cake in a one-bowl recipe that takes just minutes to put together.

The ingredients for these muffins are very similar to those of a full-size carrot cake, using a mixture of white and brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg, and generous amount of shredded carrots. When it comes to the shredded carrots for this recipe, you’ll need three or four large carrots. Shred the carrots with a cheese grater at home instead of buying pre-shredded carrots. Grated carrots are thinner and incorporate more easily into the batter, while pre-shredded carrots are sometimes thicker (because they’re used in salads and you want them to have more texture) and just aren’t quite as easy to work with, even though it seems like it will save you a couple of minutes of prep.

As the name suggests, the ingredients can all be combined in one bowl, then divided into individual muffin cups to bake. The finished muffins are moist and tender, with a slightly lighter texture than most carrot cakes tend to have. You can really smell the fragrant cinnamon and nutmeg while the muffins are baking!

Serve these up with butter or cream cheese. If you’re a big fan of cream cheese frosting, you can actually whip up a small batch to serve along side the muffins, too. The muffins can be served as soon as they have cooled, but they’ll keep for a couple of days after baking if stored in an airtight container.

One-Bowl Carrot Cake Muffins
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 large egg
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/3 cup buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups shredded carrots

Preheat oven to 350F. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with paper liners.
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, sugar and brown sugar. Add in egg, vegetable oil, buttermilk and vanilla extract and whisk to combine. Stir in shredded carrots until evenly distributed.
Divide batter evenly into prepared muffin cups.
Bake for 18-21 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the muffins comes out with only a few moist crumbs attached and the top springs back when lightly pressed.
Turn muffins our onto a wire rack to cool completely before serving.

Makes 12.

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