Carrot Cake Cookies with Cream Cheese Icing

Do you ever get on a weird food kick that you can't get to the root of? It's a serious problem with me. This week I'm obsessed with carrot cake. I can't stop thinking of different ways that I want to make it, and I partially blame these cookies for getting me there. Once I saw them in an old Bon Appetit magazine I was in love, and even though I'm seriously restricting my diet before vacation I found a way to get around that and bake them! Its an addiction. I actually made the batter, dropped it onto cookie sheets, and froze it for the week of vacation when I can eat them! Yes, and I made the cream cheese icing, too, because I'm not sure if the house will have an electric mixer. The frozen cookies and icing are travelling in the trunk in a cooler awaiting the moment we step in the cottage door to be baked, frosted, and eaten. And eaten they will be!! I'm telling you, if Riley's judgment means anything then these are almost as good as a carrot cake (ok, they're definitely as good) except they're smaller and can be made without any fancy layering or frosting. And who's ever heard of a carrot cake cookie? Ok, maybe you had, but I hadn't until this!

The changes that I made to the recipe from the magazine: used salted butter (as I always do), got rid of the self-rising flour for regular flour with baking powder and baking soda, moved the dry ingredients to the beginning so they could be whisked together first, and added vanilla extract to both the cookies and icing.

I love love love these, because I prefer a carrot cake with pure cinnamon and carrots, and possibly raisins and nuts, but NEVER EVER pineapple or coconut. Whoever thought of that should have their right to vote taken away. Because that is just wrong, and it should be made a law that such cakes must be labeled "tropical". K, now that I'm done ranting about that...

Carrot Cake Cookies with Cream Cheese Icing  
Yield: about 40 small or 15 large cookies

INGREDIENTS
For the cookies:
1/2 cup raisins
1/4 cup old fashioned oats
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
1 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup (1 stick) salted butter, at room temp
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup white sugar
1 large egg
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 cup (10-12 ounces) finely grated peeled carrots, packed
1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional)

For the cream cheese icing: 
1 cup powdered sugar
6 ounces cream cheese, at room temp
4 tbl salted butter, at room temp
2 tbl heavy cream
2 tsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS
I know I'm horrible, but I'm lazy and it's vacation and we all know how to make a cookie, right? Just soak the raisins and oats with 1/4 cup water, sift together the dry ingredients, cream the butter and sugar, add in an egg, the vanilla, and carrots. Then you can beat in the flour, but don't overmix the flour!! Use a wooden spoon to gently stir in the raisin-oat mixture and nuts, if you want them. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes. Then you can beat the frosting ingredients really well and spread them on the cookies. Enjoy!

SOURCE
recipe slightly adapted from Bon Appetit, May 2012.