Easy and delicious orange carrot cookies are made with mashed carrots and then glazed with a delicious orange icing. Perfect as a springtime dessert or breakfast treat!
Most seasons have specific desserts or flavors associated with them. Fall is the season for pumpkin spice, winter is when chocolate and peppermint reign and anything light and fruity reminds me of summer. But what about spring? In my house, any kind of dessert with carrots in its ingredient list is a springtime dessert. Carrot cake, carrot muffins and this new recipe I'm sharing today for orange carrot cookies all scream of spring!
No matter the reason, when spring comes around, I start dreaming of carrot everything. That is how I ended up creating this orange carrot cookies recipe! Besides having a whole cup of shredded carrots baked into the cookies, these tiny morsels are also bright and zesty, just like the spring season!
After baking these easy orange carrot cookies recipe once, my family and I fell in love and they quickly became a springtime favorite. They have even become our new favorite Easter cookies too!
HOW TO MAKE ORANGE CARROT COOKIES
To make my orange cookies with orange glaze, I start by beating together shortening and sugar. You can opt to use butter in place of the shortening but I have found that the shortening makes the cookies stay soft and chewy for days after baking.
Shredded carrots, eggs, vanilla and fresh orange zest are added to the mixer and beat well. The batter will look a little wet and frothy at this point. Mix the batter slowly until it becomes smooth. It may take a few minutes of slow mixing to get the perfect texture.
Add the dry ingredients to the cookie batter and then, once mixed, scoop the cookie dough onto a flat cookie sheet and bake! The batter may be a little softer than your average cookie dough but that is exactly how it should be. It is actually easiest to drop the batter off from a spoon onto the tray rather than using a cookie scoop.
Only bake the cookies until they are just beginning to turn a golden brown. If they are too dark, the orange cookies get dry and crunchy. A light golden colored cookie will be tender and chewy. They will also stay fresh for longer, keeping that nice soft texture.
I make these delicious drop cookies topped with an orange glaze and orange zest. Some powdered sugar and orange juice mix together to become a flavorful, thin glaze that will coat the cooled cookies completely. The glaze also gives the cookies a little extra sweetness. However, you can skip the orange glaze if you want them more of a less sweet, breakfast cookies. All that carrot inside the cookie makes it perfect for breakfast! Orange cookies and a cup of hot coffee is one of my favorite ways to wake up in the spring!
There is so much to love about these perfect springtime orange carrot cookies! Orange and carrot makes a wonderful, vibrant flavor combination that mimics the bright spring weather. Shredded carrot is a springtime hallmark dessert ingredient and there is plenty of that in every single cookie! The recipe is also just so easy to make that you can bake these orange carrot cookies in a matter of minutes. That's why I end up making them so often!
If you are looking for new Easter desserts or just an exciting springtime favorite, my carrot cookies recipe is the one you need to try. The sweet orange icing and the velvety texture of the cookies is something that you are sure to love. I know that my family looks forward to these every year, just as much as they crave the warm spring weather.
Give these orange cookies a try and let me know what you think. Are you now hooked on breakfast cookies? Did you serve a big platter of orange sugar cookies for Easter? Did you have to make a triple batch just to have enough?! I'd love to hear all about your cookie making experience! Enjoy!
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Glazed Orange Carrot Cookies Recipe
Description
Easy and delicious orange carrot cookies are made with mashed carrots and then glazed with a delicious orange icing. Perfect as a springtime dessert or breakfast treat!
Ingredients
Ingredients:
⅔ cup shortening or softened butter
¾ cup sugar
1 cup carrots, cooked and mashed
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon orange zest
2 cups all-purpose flour
¼ teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
Glaze:
¼ cup hot orange juice
2 cups powdered sugar
zest of 1 large or 2 small oranges, less 1 teaspoon used in cookie dough.
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- With a mixer, beat shortening and sugar until crumbly.
- Add carrots, egg, vanilla and orange zest to sugar mixture and beat until well mixed.
- Sift flour, salt and baking powder and gradually add to dough, mixing well.
- Drop by spoonfuls onto cookie sheet.
- Bake 15 minutes until golden.
- Make glaze while cookies are cooling by combining hot orange juice and powdered sugar. Stir until all lumps are smooth, then stir in zest.
- Drizzle glaze on top of cooled cookies.
- Optional: lightly sprinkle with additional orange zest for garnish.
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Orange and carrot is such a great combination of flavors. This sounds wonderful! And the orange zest on top is so pretty.
I love these cookies. I have had carrots cookies before and they are fantastic. I will try this recipe.
Looks like a great recipe for spring.
This looks soooo yummy! And easy to make, too. So saving this recipe for the weekend.
These sound amazing and absolutely perfect for springtime. I love carrot cake so I can only imagine them as cookies.
I would love to try these cookies! Plus they would be perfect for Easter!
What a unique combo of flavors! I can't wait to try!
YUM! Adding this to the menu this year!
Omg yum!! I have never tried carrot cookies, but these look delicious 😍 and now I can’t wait to bake them!! I have a feeling my kids are going to LOVE these. 😄
perfect combination of flavors!! will try this soon
This looks so good and delicious indeed! Thanks for the recipe!
These look really good. I wouldn't have thought of them but I'm definitely going to have to try.
These look delightful.
I saved this receipt to try later this spring.
I want to try Glazed Orange Carrot Cookies! It looks so yummy and tasty! I can't wait to do it.
I've never had carrot cookies these sound do intriguing!
I'm not too much of a carrot fan but I know I have to eat it. However, I do like it as a cake so these cookies are something that I'd readily eat as well.
I've honestly never tried carrot and orange together. And most especially not in a cookie. This seems interesting! Worth a try!
Wah I never even heard of carrot cookies! but thanks for the inspiration I may try it over the weeknd 😀
Those flavors sound so good together. I have to make these!
These sound delicious...and my daughters love cookies! 🏨🍕👓
So, they are like carrot cake, but in cookie form. They sound great to me!
These are perfect cookies for the summer!
These are perfect cookies for the summer!
My youngest LOVE carrots. I'll have to try this as a special treat for him
Yum! These cookies look so refreshing and delicious!
These look so good! Gonna try to make them this weekend!!
Those sound so good! I would love to try these. It's almost like carrot cake in cookie form.
Your carrot cookies looks really good and tasty, and I am going to try this at home. Thanks for sharing!
Oh my goodness, these carrot cookies looks really delicious. I need to try this recipe. Yum!
They look so yummy! I've never had carrot cookies so I'm definitely intrigued. Will have to save to try baking myself. Thanks for sharing!
wow, thank you so much for the recipe. I really love orange flavor cookies.
Thank you for sharing with us.
This sounds and looks FANTASTIC!! I’m definitely adding this to my dessert queue to try!!!
These sound and look fantastic! And not to hard to make either! Just my style!
My family makes carrot cookies each year for the holidays, but we've never tried an orange glaze (we usually do cream cheese frosting)! Yummy!
I am a big carrot cake fan--I'd even drizzle it with a whole heap of cream cheese frosting. I have never tried making carrot cookies before. Will definitely give this a try. I have a feeling that the orange zest glaze would taste good with cream cheese!! 😛
These look so yummy and delicious!! I love carrot cake!!!
I’m not a huge fan of carrot cake but my uncle loves it. I’ll have to send this recipe to his wife so she can bake them for him.
Oh I have never thought about pairing carrots and orange together. I have oranges in my fridge now I need these cookies in my life!
I am checking out some recipes to try out and glad I came over your post. I will definitely save this so I can give it a try too. Thank you for this!
this combination sounds so wonderful and the color is so pretty; adding to our must-make-soon list
This cookies sound delicious. I love the addition of the carrots.
These cookies look amazing! I love baking cookies every weekend and these are on my next to bake list.
I've had carrot cake before, but never had carrot cookies, yet. Will try making this soon.
I have never heard of this combo before, it sounds awesome!!
Mm! I’m adding this on my list to make.
These cookies look amazing! I bet they are really delicious, I want to make them soon,
These sound delicious, and refreshing too. I think this is a wonderful combination, and the citrus zest is a nice change from our usual sweets.
These look so yummy!
Glazed Orange Carrot Cookies sounds so healthy! I think I will use my excess carrots for this recipe. Thanks for sharing it. Will make it on weekends.
When I first saw the title I thought that I was going to be glazed carrots. My son makes some fabulous Spicy Maple Glazed Carrots nad I was curious as to what you do. When I saw that this is a cookie I definitely became intrigued... though in a different way...lol.