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Gluten Free Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

by 31 Comments

The BEST gluten free carrot cake. It’s moist, fluffy, and so delicious. With the easiest greek yogurt cream cheese frosting.

The perfect Spring/Easter (or anytime!!) dessert. I think this is definitely one of my top favorite recipes I have ever made. The texture and flavor are perfect, and it’s so easy!

Can’t wait to hear what you guys think 🙂 Enjoy!!

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Gluten Free Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

★★★★★ 5 from 27 reviews
  • Author: Mia Zarlengo
  • Prep Time: 15 minutes
  • Cook Time: 25 minutes
  • Total Time: 40 minutes
  • Yield: 12 slices 1x
  • Category: Dessert
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Description

Gluten free and refined sugar free carrot cake with the easiest cream cheese frosting!

Scale

Ingredients

  • 1/3 cup butter, melted (or sub vegan butter- you want the butter flavor for this one so I don’t recommend coconut oil!) ⠀
  • 2 eggs ⠀
  • 1/3 cup maple syrup ⠀
  • 1/4 cup coconut sugar ⠀
  • 1/4 cup greek yogurt (can sub dairy free yogurt or sour cream)
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 + 1/2 cups carrots, grated
  • 1 + 1/3 cup fine almond flour*
  • 1/3 cup + 3 tbsp oat flour* ⠀
  • 1/3 cup gluten free old fashioned rolled oats
  • 1 + 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp nutmeg ⠀
  • 3/4 tsp sea salt ⠀
  • 1 tsp baking soda ⠀
  • Optional add ins: raisins, pecans

FOR THE FROSTING:

  • 1/2 cup plain greek yogurt
  • 2 tbsp maple syrup
  • 1/2 tsp coconut sugar
  • Small splash of vanilla extract
  • Cinnamon and coconut sugar for topping (optional)

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F and line an 8x8in square baking dish with parchment paper.
  2. In a large bowl, whisk the butter, eggs, maple syrup, coconut sugar, yogurt, and vanilla until smooth. Stir in the shredded carrots. 
  3. Mix in the remaining dry ingredients, and stir until a smooth batter forms.⠀
  4. Pour the batter into 8×8 baking dish and use a spatula to spread it evenly.
  5. Bake for 25 minutes. Allow to cool for 5 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely before slicing. Don’t skip this cooling process, or your cake will not hold together well.
  6. While cake is cooling, whisk the frosting ingredients together in a small bowl until smooth. Once cake is cooled, spread frosting on top and sprinkle with cinnamon and coconut sugar (optional). Slice into 12 squares. Once frosted, store leftovers in the refrigerator (or leave unfrosted on the counter).

Notes

* I have not tested this with any flour substitutes! I cannot guarantee what results you will get if you do! 

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Absolute best carrot cake I’ve ever had in my life! This is for real lifechanging. We made it for Easter and we couldn’t believe how delicious it was, especially for everyone in my family who loves traditional cream cheese frosting! Carrot cake is my dad’s favorite dessert of all time and he loved it so much. My mom and I love all your recipes but think this one wins. Will be making this again and again!

    ★★★★★

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  2. So good and easy to make!! Mine took a little longer then 25 minutes. So delicious and perfect for Easter!!! It’s a guilt free dessert that still taste amazing. Would make it again.

    ★★★★★

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  3. Loved making this! It was so simple and turned out great! I’m a sucker for frosting so I doubled the amount to make a thicker layer.

    ★★★★★

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  4. So good & so easy to make! I was skeptical of the frosting at first but the flavor was amazing and my family had no idea it was yogurt based. Can’t wait to make it for ever Easter 🙂

    ★★★★★

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  5. I loved this! Carrot cake is my boyfriends favorite dessert and he really enjoyed it! I made a vegan version using flax seeds for the “egg” and used vegan butter and vegan greek style yogurt. It turned out so nicely!

    ★★★★★

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  6. This was amazing! I love all of your recipes and this once, to no surprise, was just as good as the others! My family could not get enough of this yesterday for our Easter dessert 😋 thanks, again!

    ★★★★★

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  7. I made this for Easter and it was absolutely amazing! Even my boyfriend who usually refuses to eat gluten free foods loved it!!

    ★★★★★

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  8. Seriously stop what you’re doing right now & make this carrot cake! It is unreal! I promise you won’t regret baking & eating this cake

    ★★★★★

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  10. So so yummy!! I ran out of yogurt so I ended up going with a traditional cream cheese frosting, but the cake base was to die for. My brothers who refuse to eat anything gluten free or remotely healthy loved this, as did the rest of my family. Will be making again and again – next time with the yogurt-based frosting! Thanks!

    ★★★★★

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  11. I made these for Easter and my entire family was obsessed! I made them dairy free and used cashew milk yogurt and they turned out amazing!

    ★★★★★

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  13. Best carrot cake I’ve ever made and so easy to make also!!! Was definitely a big hit at my home.

    ★★★★★

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  14. So delicious! My sister in law and I made it together last night (me in Chicago, she in Salt Lake City) and both batches turned out amazing!! Will make again. Also toddler approved.

    ★★★★★

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  15. So yum and so easy to make loved it! It’s my best dessert out of the fridge and with some morning coffee in bed ♥️

    ★★★★★

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  17. So good! I made the cake with df cashew yogurt but kept the Greek yogurt in the frosting. Turned out great – love this recipe!!

    ★★★★★

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  18. This recipe is amazing! Perfect carrot cake flavor. I was looking for a slightly healthier carrot cake for Easter since we’d already had a lot of sweets, and this was perfect. I had oat flour but ran out of rolled oats so I subbed in shredded coconut for the 1/3 c rolled oats, and it turned out great – though a little fudgier in the middle than the original recipe because the oats weren’t there to soak up liquid. Thank you for this recipe!

    ★★★★★

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  19. super Easy recipe to follow and make. I added crushed pecans to ours and it was delicious! Very moist. Everyone loved it so it went pretty quickly!

    ★★★★★

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  20. This is the best guilt free carrot cake that I’ve made! So yummy!!! Easy and quick recipe with staples that you’d have at home. Next time I might just double the frosting 🙂

    ★★★★★

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  21. I love everything about this recipe! first off it tastes amazing like… how is this healthy!! it’s also super easy and quick to make, will be making this many many more times!!

    ★★★★★

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  24. Loved this recipe!! Made this for an Easter treat and it was honestly better than I was expecting. My boyfriend didn’t believe me when I told him it was a healthy version.. that’s when you know it’s good. If you can somehow not eat the entire cake in day 1 you’ll be rewarded because it’s even better the next day after sitting in the fridge *drools on keyboard* Thanks Mia!

    ★★★★★

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  25. Hi there – I was excited to try making this over the weekend, but couldn’t find oat flour at the store 🙁 Are there any substitutions you recommend?

    Reply

    • Hi! I’ve been making my own by grinding up rolled oats in the blender 🙂 If you can get your hands on oats I definitely recommend that!

      Reply

  26. Loved these!!
    I subbed the oat flour for cassava (all I had), and they still turned out great. A little fragile when cutting, and baked for about 24 min.

    ★★★★★

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