By Faith Bahadurian, Special Writer
Among the tattered and stained recipe cards in my late father’s files I found a treasure: the recipe for the carrot cake he often made. I loved that cake. When he got older, it became a two- or even three-step process for him, over a period of a couple days: chop the nuts, grate the carrots, blend the dry ingredients. Then combine it all together and make the cream cheese frosting while the cake bakes.
He proudly made it countless times, always eager to share it with anyone who stopped by. Even when his cooking skills had deteriorated to the point where I was reluctant to try many of his “creations” (sorry Dad!), I still couldn’t resist that cake.
I hadn’t asked him for the recipe because it was so often available at his house, so it was a surprise to find it was titled “Nassau Inn Carrot Cake.” If I ever knew, I’d long since forgotten that that was the (putative) source, or how he came by it, which happened after I’d moved away from the area for many years.
The 3-by-5-inch index card is written on both sides (cake on one, frosting on the other) by an unknown feminine hand. There’s even a notation off on the side, “4:15,” which must be the time it went into the oven one day.
This recipe includes a can of crushed pineapple, which is not unheard of, and a very nice addition, I always thought. I suspect identical, or nearly so, versions of this cake are all over the Internet and in various cookbooks, but am reluctant to look, not wanting to take the “magic” away from Dad’s recipe.
But of course I had to ask the staff over at the Inn, where I frequently book rooms for my University department’s visitors, if they still make this cake. Not only did they not have it on their menu, even General Manager Lori Rabon, who has been there more than 20 years, was unaware of any tradition of making a signature carrot cake at the Inn.
As you might imagine, the handwritten recipe card is short on detailed instructions. The brief notes are concise, and assume a certain amount of culinary knowledge on the part of the baker. But don’t overthink the recipe; it really is a simple one, largely because of the use of cooking oil, rather than butter or shortening. That means you don’t need to cream the fat and sugar together before adding eggs, etc. This is easy-peasy, once you’ve done the prep.
I also noticed the recipe calls for baking the cake in a 9-by-13-inch pan or a Bundt pan (the kind with a hole in the middle). But my father often baked it in two round layers instead, and frosted it just like any other two-layer cake. It’s a bit unusual to frost a Bundt cake anyway, a rounded, domed shape that better lends itself to glazing than frosting. But, oh, this frosting! Classic cream cheese with a half-pound each of that and the butter — sinfully delicious and be sure to use a high-quality vanilla (my favorite is Nielsen-Massey vanilla bean paste).
Now the Nassau Inn has asked their Executive Chef, Nino LoCascio, to make the cake with Dad’s recipe (below), with an eye to maybe offering it occasionally at the Yankee Doodle Tap Room.
Maybe, in return for my restoring the recipe to them, they’ll call it “Sam’s Carrot Cake?”.
Nassau Inn Carrot Cake
Via Sam Bahadurian
Mix in order:
4 eggs
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 ½ cups cooking oil
2 cups grated carrots
Sift together and add:
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
Stir in:
8 ½ ounces crushed pineapple, drained
1 ½ cups chopped walnuts (or pecans)
Grease pan liberally, Bake in 350 degree oven. 9-by-13 pan – 1 hour; Bundt pan – 1 ½ hours. Better to overcook – ‘til edges really pull away from pan – cannot remove otherwise.
Frosting:
Cream together in order:
8 ounces butter
8 ounces cream cheese
1 pound powdered sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
Faith Bahadurian blogs at www.packetinsider.com/ blog/njspice (also www.twitter.com/njspice).
