carrot cupcakes

lucy really wanted to do some baking the other day and as she is recently obsessed with carrots (orange twiglets... a charlie and lola reference...) i decided to make carrot cupcakes. once again ina garten had a delicious looking recipe, but it sounded just a little too intense. i tried this recipe instead, which was not nearly as good as i imagine the barefoot contessa's to be. i did, however, use her recipe for cream cheese frosting, so i guess i should have just gone all out anyway...
they were still pretty good...


Ingredients
3/4 cup whole-wheat pastry flour (as i did not actually have pastry flour, i just used whole-wheat flour...)
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 cup canola oil
3/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup natural applesauce
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups finely shredded carrots (about 2 medium carrots)
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons finely chopped walnuts (we did not have walnuts, so i just left them out altogether...)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line 12 muffin cups with paper liners.
Sift together the first 6 ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk the oil, brown sugar and eggs until well combined. Whisk in the applesauce, vanilla and carrots. Add the dry ingredients and mix until combined. Stir in 1/4 cup of the chopped walnuts.
Divide the batter between the muffin cups. Bake until a toothpick comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.



For the frosting: (this is from ina garten... does she have a recipe that doesn't at least use some butter?)
3/4 pound cream cheese, at room temperature
1/2 pound unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 pound confectioners' sugar

For the frosting, cream the cream cheese, butter, and vanilla in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Add the sugar and beat until smooth.