Carrot Cakes with Cointreau Glaze

Carrot cake is one of those desserts that often gets a bad rap. People read "carrot" and automatically think "healthy." I mean, there's usually nuts and all kinds of nice stuff in there, right? So we of course slather it with cream cheese icing to make up for the fact that there may be good-for-you ingredients and the result is a tasty but often overly sweet dessert.

I made some lovely Carrot Cake Muffins  a while back, and I had some extra carrots in the crisper, so I decided to make them into little cake-like loaves this time around, using the same recipe, but tweaking it a bit. I added dried cranberries and used the leftover liquid from the "spiked" raisins and cranberries to make a lovely glaze for the top, and drizzled it over the warm cakes (whisk together with 2 TBS of half/half, 1 cup of confectioners' sugar, and 1/4 tsp of vanilla extract). Instead of adding a cloyingly sweet cream-cheese icing, I let the carrots (and Cointreau) speak for themselves.

The result?

Need I say more?
xoxo

Pssst! Can't get enough carrots? Try these other great carrot recipes: Carrot Pancakes, Roasted Carrots with Maple-Harissa Glaze, and Carrot Soufflé