We love this cake mix carrot cake bundt cake recipe with cream cheese filling! Best dessert with shredded carrots, nuts, pineapple and raisins that bakes in the oven to moist like Nothing Bundt Cakes style. Best cake mix hack it is a family favorite treat.
A Bundt cake with carrots is a surprising treat. If you have never incorporated shredded vegetables into your batter it just makes it super moist and still stays sweet. An Old Fashioned Grandma dessert you likely had as a child but we have amped it up here.
We talk all about How Long to Bake a Bundt Cake here. You do NOT want it to dry out and even one minute longer than needed will do just that. The key is to check after the minimum baking time listed below because ovens will vary. Using a toothpick is fine but you want some moist crumbs attached, not baked until dry.
If you do decide to make semi-homemade with boxed cake mix, we give you different things to add vs. what is listed on the box. Instead we transition this into a pudding cake, which means super duper tender with the addition of that box.
Ingredient Notes
- You are going to want to ideally start with a box of carrot cake mix, you can find this in almost any grocery store. Best alternative would be spice mix but you would need to shred carrots and add in that case.
- 1 box of instant vanilla pudding mix will be added to make it as moist as possible. You do not make it before adding, you just incorporate the dry mix itself into the batter.
- I like to add some more cinnamon into the mix for a Fall flavor
- You will want to add some water, or really any liquid would do.
- The melted butter will enhance the flavors and once again make it more moist and tender
- I add vegetable oil but you could alternatively use applesauce or pumpkin puree. Those will work but will create a denser outcome.
- Use large room temperature eggs
- And some vanilla extract
- Add full fat sour cream or plain Greek yogurt to make super tender too
- You can also add crushed pineapple (not drained) or leave out.
with Cake Mix
We love to make this Bundt Cake with Cake Mix because you need much fewer ingredients but your guests will think it was homemade. I mean you can just use boxed mix that has freeze dried carrots in the mix with the ingredients listed on the box, but these make it moister.
Homemade Version
If you wanted to make this from scratch we have our Carrot Cake Pound Cake you can follow here. Both are baked in the same pan but this has quite a few more ingredients of course. If you have time, homemade is fabulous.
Carrot Bundt Cake Recipe
Equipment
- 1 Bowl
Ingredients
- 1 box cake mix, carrot version
- 1 box instant pudding mix, vanilla, 3.4 oz
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 cup water, or half apple or pineapple juice
- 1/2 cup butter, melted
- 1/3 cup vegetable oil, or mashed bananas
- 4 large eggs
- 1.5 tsp vanilla
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1 cup pineapple, crushed style, not drained
Instructions
- Mix together ingredients for the batter, add shredded carrots that have been pressed in a few paper towels to remove moisture at the end. Preheat oven to 325F.
- In a bowl use a mixer to beat together cream cheese layer ingredients if you want to add this in middle. Spoon into piping or freezer bag with corner snipped off if adding.
- Take a bundt pan and spray generously with baking spray. Pour the carrot cake batter into the bundt pan filling halfway if you want to pipe cream cheese into the middle. Cut a large hole in the end of the piping bag with the cream cheese filling. Pipe the cream cheese in circles around the middle of this carrot cake batter.
- Now pour more of the carrot cake batter on top of this layer, filling the pan ¾ of the way full. Bake in the oven for 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out mostly clean with moist crumbs attached.
- When the cake comes out of the oven, let cool on a cooling rack for 10-15 minutes before putting plate on top, holding, and flipping over on a plate to slide out.
- Pipe or warm cream cheese frosting and pour over the top, slice and serve.
Video
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Can you bake carrot cake into muffins?
You could make this into Apple Carrot Muffins Recipe too in a muffin tin. Makes 24 at least and only takes 18 minutes or so to bake to fluffy. Now let’s talk a minute about add ins. I would stick to 1/2 cup of one. Diced apples, raisins or chopped pecans / nuts are the most common you might decide to add.
How to Make Cream Cheese Frosting with 3 Ingredients
If you do want to add a Cream Cheese Layer into the center you would need these 3 things to mix with a stand or electric mixer until creamy. Piping into a bag to squeeze in is recommended so the same amount is added all the way around the center of the batter.
- 8 oz cream cheese softened
- 1/2 c sugar
- 1/2 tsp vanilla
Cream cheese frosting without butter is what I make for the topping. Or for an easy choice you can just whisk together powdered sugar with a bit of milk and vanilla extract until as thick as you’d like.
in a Pressure Cooker
I have made this into Instant Pot Carrot Cake in a mini size but this would make a few of them, but made one at a time. A great size for gifting during the holidays so if you want an in between size that is larger than a mini bundt but not as big as this, I suggest this method.
in a Mini Bundt Pan
If you want to make this into a few Mini Bundt Cake individual servings you can. Timing is much faster, cuts it down to 20 minutes vs. 1 hour. You don’t have to slice them at all either which is kinda’ nice and looks super cute. For a classic carrot cake you would;
