Carrot Cake w/ Cream Cheese Frosting

I stumbled across and am so glad I did. It's my brother Rich's favorite kind of cake. I'm trusting this is as good as she says it is!

  makes 3 9" cake rounds, 16 slices
Cake:
2 cups sugar
½ cup + 2 tbsp coconut oil
½ cup + 2 tbsp unsweetened apple sauce
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp freshly grated nutmeg
½ tsp salt
4 eggs
¾ cup crushed, canned pineapple in 100% juice, don't drain
2 cups finely grated raw carrots
1 cup chopped pecans

Frosting
12 oz cream cheese
1½ sticks (or ¾ cup) butter, softened
3 tsp vanilla
3 cups powdered sugar
1 cups chopped nuts, for the outside of the cake

Preheat oven to 325°. In a large bowl, cream sugar, oil and apple sauce together and set aside.
In another bowl, mix flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt together.
Add dry ingredients to wet and mix. Add eggs and mix. Add pineapple, carrots and pecans and mix.
Spray 3 9" baking pans with Baker's Joy and distribute batter evenly.
Bake cakes for about 30 minutes, rotating the pans in the oven at 15 minutes. You may want to check the cakes with a few minutes to spare; mine were perfect at 28 minutes.
Cool cakes for a few minutes, then remove from pan and let cool completely on cooling racks. Let cakes chill in fridge before next step. To insure your cake layers won't slide around, take a serrated knife and keeping knife flat, saw back and forth to remove the very top layer.
Now your cakes will sit evenly. Place cakes in fridge while making frosting.
Meanwhile, to make the frosting, cream the butter and cream cheese together in mixer with flat paddle attachment, until smooth.
Add in vanilla and mix.
Add in powdered sugar, about a cup and a time. Begin with mixer on low so you don't make a mess.
Mix until frosting is smooth and creamy.
Place a small bit of frosting on cake plate and spread around the middle so that your cake will have something to "grab on to," to keep it from sliding around.
Place one cake on plate and frost the top completely with an off set spatula.
Repeat with other layers.
Frost a thin layer around the outside of the cake and pop it in the fridge for a few minutes to let the frosting firm up.
Add another layer of the frosting the the cake.
Last, grab handfuls of chopped pecans and stick them to the outside of the cake.