These high altitude carrot cake cookies are the perfect treat to make for Easter! This is a recipe for soft and chewy, spiced carrot cookies, frosted with cream cheese buttercream. Decorate them with pretty piped frosting and sprinkles in spring colors for the holiday.
You might also love these Easter egg sugar cookies, carrot cake walnut scones, and hot cross muffins.
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Why You’ll Love This Recipe
Soft but not Cakey. Today’s carrot cookies are very soft, but they’re chewy cookies, not fluffy cakey cookies. If you’re looking for a cakey carrot cookie, you’d like these carrot cake whoopie pies instead.
Tastes like Carrot Cake. With sweet and tangy cream cheese frosting and lots of warm spices, these cookies taste just like your favorite carrot cake.
High Altitude Tested. I develop all the recipes on my site for Denver’s altitude of 5,280 feet. If you’re at a lower or higher elevation, please see my FAQs for guidance on adjusting recipes for your altitude.
See the recipe card at the end of the post for the full ingredients list and instructions.
Ingredients
- Carrots. Peel the carrots first, then grate them. I used my ninja to finely chop them instead of grate them, which works fine, too. Pack them tightly into a 1/2 cup measuring cup, or just weigh 4 ounces of grated carrots. To remove some of the moisture from the carrots, you’ll need to blot them with paper towels. This may seem strange, but is important for the texture of the cookie.
- Spices. A combination of cinnamon, allspice, ginger, nutmeg, cloves and vanilla adds so much flavor to these carrot cake cookies.
- Butter + Cream Cheese. For the frosting, you’ll be using a combination of butter and block cream cheese, which makes a much more stable cream cheese frosting.
- Corn Starch. This may seem unusual in cream cheese frosting, but it helps to thicken and stabilize it.
Instructions
Cookies
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
- On a plate, blot the grated carrots dry with paper towels. You may need to change the paper towels a few times to remove enough moisture from the carrots. When the carrots are dry enough, barely any moisture should transfer to the paper towels.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or using a hand held electric mixer), beat the softened butter with the brown sugar for 5 minutes on medium speed, until fluffy.
- Add the dried carrots, egg yolks and vanilla, and mix on low until combined.
- In a separate bowl, combine the flour with the baking soda, salt and spices. Add the dry ingredients to the dough and mix on low just until combined.
- Use a medium cookie scoop with a release lever (approximately 1 1/2 tbsp capacity) to scoop 2 dozen balls of dough. Roll the balls smooth between your hands, and do not flatten the balls. Chill the dough balls in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.
- Space the cookies 3 inches apart on your baking sheet and bake for 10-11 minutes, until the cookies have spread and the edges set. Cool on the baking sheet for 1 minute, then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely before frosting.
Frosting
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter and cream cheese for 1 minute until smooth.
- With the mixer on low, add the powdered sugar, corn starch, vanilla and salt.
- Increase the speed to medium and beat for several minutes, stopping to scrape the bowl down occasionally, until fluffy.
- Frost your cookies, either with an offset icing spatula or with piping bags and piping tips. Before the buttercream crusts over, decorate with sprinkles. For the rosettes and drop flowers, I used tip 1M. For the carrots, I used tip 7. For the leaves, I used tip 352.
Be sure to read all of my BAKING FAQs where I discuss ingredients, substitutions and common baking questions, so that you can be successful in your own baking!
Frequently Asked Questions
Store unfrosted cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days, or in the freezer for up to 3-6 months. Frosted cookies can be stored in a single layer at room temperature for up to 1 day, or in the refrigerator for several days. Let come to room temperature before serving.
For the rosettes and drop flowers, I used tip 1M. For the carrots, I used tip 7. And for the leaves, I used tip 352.
Today’s carrot cookies are very soft, but they’re chewy cookies, not fluffy cakey cookies. If you’re looking for a cakey carrot cookie, you’d like these carrot cake whoopie pies instead.
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High Altitude Carrot Cake Cookies
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- Electric Mixer (Stand or Hand-Held)
- Medium Cookie Scoop with Release Lever (1 1/2 tbsp capacity)
- Baking Sheet + Parchment Paper
- Paper Towels, for blotting the carrots dry
- Disposable Piping Bags (plus couplers, and tips 1M, 7 and 352)
Ingredients
Cookies
- ½ cup (4 oz) peeled and finely grated carrots
- ¾ cup (12 tbsp) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1 cup light brown sugar, lightly packed
- 2 large egg yolks (save the whites for another use)
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- ¾ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp ground allspice
- ½ tsp ground ginger
- ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
- ¼ tsp ground cloves
Frosting
- ¾ cup unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 6 oz block cream cheese, softened to room temperature
- 3 ¾ cups powdered sugar
- 1 ½ tbsp corn starch
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- ¼ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount
- sprinkles
- gel food coloring (orange and leaf green)
Instructions
Cookies
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
- On a plate, blot the grated carrots dry with paper towels. You may need to change the paper towels a few times to remove enough moisture from the carrots. When the carrots are dry enough, barely any moisture should transfer to the paper towels.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or using a hand held electric mixer), beat the softened butter with the brown sugar for 5 minutes on medium speed, until fluffy.
- Add the dried carrots, egg yolks and vanilla, and mix on low until combined.
- In a separate bowl, combine the flour with the baking soda, salt and spices. Add the dry ingredients to the dough and mix on low just until combined.
- Use a medium cookie scoop with a release lever (approximately 1 1/2 tbsp capacity) to scoop 2 dozen balls of dough. Roll the balls smooth between your hands, and do not flatten the balls. Chill the dough balls in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.
- Space the cookies 3 inches apart on your baking sheet and bake for 10-11 minutes, until the cookies have spread and the edges set. Cool on the baking sheet for 1 minute, then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely before frosting.
Frosting
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter and cream cheese for 1 minute until smooth.
- With the mixer on low, add the powdered sugar, corn starch, vanilla and salt.
- Increase the speed to medium and beat for several minutes, stopping to scrape the bowl down occasionally, until fluffy.
- Frost your cookies, either with an offset icing spatula or with piping bags and piping tips. Before the buttercream crusts over, decorate with sprinkles. For the rosettes and drop flowers, I used tip 1M. For the carrots, I used tip 7. For the leaves, I used tip 352.
I made these carrot cake cookies and they were so good, I had to make another batch before icing the first batch. Even better with the cream cheese icing was the consensus-worth the wait!