Almond Flour Carrot Cake
This delicious Almond Flour Carrot Cake Recipe is the only one you will need! It’s decadent, moist, and has the perfect tender crumb. Topped with homemade cream cheese icing, it doesn’t get much better than this.
Since I already have a fancy layered Keto Carrot Cake, I wanted to make a simple almond flour carrot cake for those days I just want to eat cake! When I’m not trying to impress anyone, I prefer bars, brownies, and cakes made in my old standard 8×8 glass baking dish.
Carrot cake is one of those desserts that pretty much has to be at any family party or holiday, especially Easter. Being able to create a gluten free version of a traditional carrot cake was so important to me. Who can resist all the incredible spices and cream cheese frosting? Not me!
Besides being delicious, it also happens to be gluten-free, keto-friendly, sugar free, and has only 2.7 net carbs per piece.
And if you have never made a healthy carrot cake recipe before, this is the perfect one to start with. It is simple and delicious.
Love this recipe? Try my Keto Pound Cake and Almond Flour Chocolate Cake next!
Ingredients
- Almond Flour – Naturally, almond flour is the heart of an almond flour carrot cake.
- Sweetener – Carrots are naturally pretty sweet, but you will need a little more sweetener. You can use a granular white sweetener or brown sugar sweetener.
- Half and Half – You’ll need to use half and half for both the cake and the icing. It’s important for both, but you could also swap it for canned coconut milk or heavy cream.
- Butter – Butter is needed for both the cream cheese frosting and the cake.
- Eggs – Adding eggs as a binder is needed.
- Cinnamon – I love adding ground cinnamon, and it has the best warm spice flavor! You could also use nutmeg, allspice, cloves, and/or pumpkin pie spice to change up the results.
- Baking Powder – Always make sure your baking powder is fresh.
- Shredded Carrots – Make sure the grated carrots are shredded pretty thin.
- Coconut Flakes – If you aren’t a fan of coconut, you can leave them out, but they add low carb bulk to the cake.
- Cream Cheese – Tangy cream cheese frosting is always the star of the show for any carrot cake.
- Powdered Sweetener – Be sure to use finely ground powdered erythritol or powdered allulose, or the texture will be gritty.
- Vanilla – Vanilla extract is just what you need to complete the frosting.
- Salt – Just a pinch to enhance the other flavors.
See quantities in the recipe card.
How To Make Almond Flour Carrot Cake
1️⃣ Prep
Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Then use non-stick spray to grease a glass 8×8 baking dish.
2️⃣ Make the Batter
Mix together the almond flour, sweetener, half and half, butter, eggs, cinnamon, and baking powder in a food processor. Mix until smooth.
👉 Tip: You do not need to separate the wet ingredients and dry ingredients. Just toss them all into the food processor together!
3️⃣ Add the Mix-Ins
Fold in the coconut flakes and shredded carrots.
4️⃣ Add the Batter to the Pan
Spread the gluten-free carrot cake batter in the greased pan. It will be thick.
5️⃣ Bake the Cake
Bake for 35 minutes or until it’s firm when you touch it. The edges should be golden brown. Then let it cool completely.
6️⃣ Make the Icing
While the carrot cake is baking, cream together the cream cheese, sweetener, butter, half and half, and vanilla together in a large bowl. For best results, use an electric mixer or stand mixer with the whisk attachment so you get the right texture. If it’s too thick, you can add a little bit more half and half.
7️⃣ Frost the Cake
Add dollops of frosting all over the cooled cake. Then gently spread. Serve and enjoy!
👉 Tip: You have to be gentle when spreading the icing or the cake with crumble. It is best to drop small spoonfuls all over the cake and then spread those out.
Storage
After you have baked the cake and allowed it to cool to room temperature, you can place it in a sealed container in the freezer or fridge. It’s important that it is airtight, so it doesn’t go bad quickly.
For added protection, you can even wrap it up in plastic wrap before putting it in an airtight container.
It will last in the fridge for up to 5 days and in the freezer for up to 3 months. Thaw the cake in the fridge before eating. The frosting is best when it’s fairly cold.
It’s important never to let the almond flour carrot cake set out longer than 1-2 hours at a time. The cream cheese frosting will spoil quickly if you allow it to sit out too long.
Variations
- Nuts – I love to add nuts to carrot cake. Pecans, walnuts, and even hazelnuts are all pretty delicious. You can add them whole, but I prefer to chop them up fairly small. Sprinkle on top of the frosting or add them to the cake when you fold in the carrots.
- Dairy Free – You can easily make this a gluten free dairy free cake by swapping in coconut oil or another vegetable oil for the butter and coconut cream for the half and half. For a simply dairy-free glaze just mix powdered sweetener with a little melted coconut oil until it is thin enough to drizzle on top. You can flavor the glaze with vanilla extract and/or cinnamon.
- Layer Cake – If you are looking for a fancy low carb carrot cake with cake layers made in round cake pans and full of icing, I have one of those too! Check out my Keto Carrot Cake. It is perfect for special occasions.
- Raisins – I personally don’t care for raisins in my carrot cakes but if you do and you aren’t following a low carb keto diet feel free to add some golden raisins or black raisins!
- Carrot Cake Muffins – You can turn this into muffins if you’d like. It will make about 8 regular sized muffins. Line you muffin tins with parchment paper liners and spray with cooking spray.
- Cookies – Make sure to check out my variation on this to make Carrot Cake Cookies!
Common Questions
Can you replace flour with almond flour?
In many recipes, you can replace wheat flour with almond flour. I normally like to use a combination of 3 parts almond flour to 1 part coconut flour. The coconut flour balances the oiliness from the almonds.
Does carrot cake contain gluten?
Traditional carrot cake has white flour and does contain gluten. This almond flour cake is gluten-free.
Can I substitute coconut flour?
No, I’m sorry for this recipe; you really need to use almond flour. It gives the cake a delicious texture, and if you went with coconut flour, it’s going to turn out super dry. Coconut flour tends to absorb moisture, and for this recipe, we don’t want that.
If you need to make this nut free a better sub would be sunflower seed flour. Sunflower seed flour can be used 1:1 to replace almond flour in almond flour recipes.
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Almond Flour Carrot Cake
Ingredients
Cake Ingredients:
- 2 cups almond flour
- 1/4 cup Joy Filled Eats Sweetener (or see alternatives in recipe notes)
- 3 oz half and half
- 3 tbsp butter
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 3/4 cup shredded carrots
- 1/2 cup coconut flakes
- pinch salt
Cream Cheese Filling:
- 4 oz cream cheese
- 4-6 tbsp powdered sweetener finely ground
- 2 tbsp butter
- 1-3 tsp half and half
- 1/2 tsp vanilla
- pinch salt
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350. Spray an 8×8 baking dish with cooking spray.
- Combine the almond flour, sweetener, half and half, butter, eggs, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt in a food processor. Process until smooth. Stir in the carrots and coconut flakes.
- Spread the batter in the prepared pan. Bake for 35 minutes or until firm to the touch and golden around the edges. Cool completely.
- Meanwhile, cream together the filling ingredients with an electric mixer until smooth. If it is too thick add more half and half. Drop dollops on the cooled cake. Gently spread the icing.
Notes
Nutrition
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Originally Published September 10, 2021. Revised and Republished February 13, 2026.
I have your recipe for the double layer carrot cake. Why do you put cream cheese in that cake mix but not this one?
It’s just a different take on a carrot cake. I’d be curious to hear your thoughts if you try both.
hey I really like the idea of this recipe, I’m not keto but I am gluten free, for me the batter was thick and it was just a very small amount, I made it work though, for the cream cheese I doubled the cream cheese amount, for the sweetener I used light brown sugar, made this for my grandma’s 80th birthday, I tried some of it and it turned out good, for my sake I would double the whole recipe, I do like this thank you for providing me with a base recipe! happy baking
Hi Myles, this is a smaller batch recipe to fit in a square pan. It does fluff up as it bakes. You can double for a 9×13 pan or to make a layer cake. I’m glad you liked it!
I thought this was really great and I made muffins instead of a cake so it took about 20 minutes to cook– I rung out the extra moisture from the shredded carrots before adding them in and subbed a little maple syrup and honey in as my sweetener and added a packet of vital proteins. I also used a thrown together frosting by whipping together some cream cheese, plain greek yogurt, cottage cheese, shredded coconut, vanilla and another packet of vital proteins. It all actually turned out pretty good! Thanks for the base recipe!
I love coffee cake and this recipe came out so good. Everyone loved it!
This was so much lighter than I expected–which was great! Loved the flavor!