Carrot Cake Whoopie Pies

I have only made whoopie pies once before and they were a delicious disaster. They did not rise and became yummy cookies. I was a bit apprehensive about my second try at whoopies but thankfully they turned out fine. I wanted to make carrot cake for the Easter bunny but having just made cupcakes and cake I went for this recipe. They rose magnificently, and in fact became almost as big as my face.

 

Carrot cake whoopie pies with orange cream cheese icing (whoopie recipe adapted from The Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days, icing adapted from here)

 

1 egg

150g caster sugar

125g plain yoghurt

25ml milk

2 tsp vanilla essence

75g butter, melted, plus 55g, softened

275g plain flour

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

1/4 tsp baking powder

3/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1/4 tsp salt

100g peeled and grated carrots

Cooking spray

225g cream cheese, softened

3-4 cups icing sugar

Zest of 1 orange

Juice of 1/2 orange

 

1. Beat the egg and sugar in an electric mixer until combined. Stir together the yoghurt, milk and vanilla, and add to egg and sugar mixture. Add 75g of melted butter and mix on a low speed until just combined.
2. Sift together flour, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda and salt. Add to the egg mixture and mix gently until just combined.
3. Squeeze any excess liquid from carrots and add to mixture. Mix until just combined. Chill the batter for 30 minutes.
4. Preheat the oven to 170 degrees Celsius. Grease two baking trays with spray.
5. Spoon batter onto trays in small mounds (approx. 3-5cm in diameter and 3cm apart as they will spread). The batter is fairly easy to reshape into nice mounds.
6. Bake for 10-13 minutes or until lightly golden and springy to touch. Cool completely on wire racks.
7. To make the icing, beat the cream cheese with 55g softened butter. Beat in 3 cups of icing sugar, then the orange zest and juice. Add more icing sugar until the desired thickness is reached.
8. Ice half of the cooled whoopie pies with icing and sandwich with the remaining halves.