But since possibly no one else besides me wants to eat carrot cake in December (or maybe you do too??), I try to pack as much carrot cake as I can into the few weeks between St. Patrick’s Day and Easter.
Because I’ve already posted carrot cake cupcakes, carrot cake oatmeal, and a healthy carrot cake recipe on the blog, this year I decided to turn the flavor into banana bread, which is one of my other favorite recipes.
I knew the carrot cake banana bread was going to be good before even trying it; there was no possible way it couldn’t be good – it was carrot cake AND banana bread!
INGREDIENTS
FOR THE BANANA BREAD
Cooking spray, for pan
1/2 c. melted butter
3/4 c. sugar
1/2 c. brown sugar
2 large eggs
1/4 c. whole milk
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
2 c. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. kosher salt
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
3 large ripe bananas, mashed
1/4 c. grated carrots
1/4 c. chopped pecans, plus more for garnish
FOR THE FROSTING
8 oz. block cream cheese, softened
1 c. butter, softened
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
1/4 tsp. kosher salt
1/2 c. powdered sugar
DIRECTIONS
Make banana bread: Preheat oven to 350º, then grease a 9″-x-5″ loaf pan with cooking spray and line with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, stir together butter and sugars until combined. Add eggs, milk, and vanilla and mix until combined. Slowly add in flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, salt, and nutmeg and stir until completely incorporated. Gently fold in bananas, carrots, and pecans and mix until fully combined.
Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth top with a spatula. Bake about 1 hour, until a toothpick comes out with moist crumbs, then let cool.
Make frosting: In a large bowl using a hand mixer, beat cream cheese and butter until smooth. Beat in vanilla, salt, and powdered sugar until fluffy.
Once cool, frost bread and garnish with pecans.