Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Icing

Part of the reason that I only had toast for dinner on Tuesday was that I had filled up on carrot cake with cream cheese icing. One of my colleagues got married at the beginning of July and like many of us she had been in a ridiculous diet so that she would fit into her dress. One weekend she had broken her diet by eating some carrot cake. Sadly the calories weren't worth the cake, it looked fantastic but tasted awful.

 I promised that once the wedding was over I would make some proper, good tasting carrot cake for her and bring it into work and so last Monday evening I made some and took it into work on Tuesday when it went down a storm.

Carrot Cake with Orange Icing

Made some carrot cake for this week's dairy free cake offering. I made some orange icing instead of the cream cheese icing by mixing some unrefined icing sugar with freshly squeezed orange juice, yum!

Pumpkin Curry with Chickpeas

On the Sunday my Mum and her partner had the newlyweds and a few of their friends around for lunch. There was a beef in beer option for the meat eaters and this lovely pumpkin curry for the vegetarians. These were served with baked potatoes and salad and of course left over wedding cake. Mum had also made a proper chocolate mousse and a boozy tiramisu too. They were delicious. I will have to get the recipes.

We were lucky enough to have some left over curry, jacket potatoes and salad to take home with us. We had a few mouthfuls in the car on the way home but were very full up and so didn't have any dinner.

We were still full up on Monday which was Mr VST's birthday. We had the day off work which meant a lie in and a late breakfast (11am). We ate the jackets, curry and most of the salad for lunch - at 3pm! We were planning on going out for dinner but didn't because we were too full up.



Mr VST was starting a new job on Tuesday and wanted to take in some birthday cake so I made carrot cake number two. I managed to take a photograph this time though. I made the icing with double the butter to make it thicker and therefore easier for Mr VST to transport. I also remembered to take a photo of the finished article this time!

Carrot Cake

This carrot cake has become a bit of a birthday tradition for Mr VST and his older brother too. It's so easy to make and really light and sweet with the cream cheese icing.

Ingredients:
Cake itself:
450g golden caster sugar
125ml/4 fl oz vegetable oil
125ml/4fl oz orange juice
225g carrots, peeled and grated
225g plain flour
1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
4 eggs
1 tsp mixed spice
1 tsp ground cinnamon

Icing:
225g icing sugar
225g full fat cream cheese
55g butter
1tsp vanilla essence
175g chopped walnuts or pecans

1. Preheat the oven to 190 C/Gas 5. Line with greaseproof paper either one roasting tin like I did or two 2 x 9 inch round cake tins.

2. Mix the caster sugar, vegetable oil, orange juice, eggs and carrots together and whisk for 2 minutes.

3. Sift dry ingredients together and then add a quarter at a time to the carrot mixture. 

4. Divide the mixture into tins and bake for 35-45 mins.

5. For the icing cream the butter, then mix with the cream cheese. Add the vanilla essence and mix in well before sifting the icing sugar into the mixture slowly.

6. When the cake has cooled spread the icing all over the top and sides (and middle if you are making a 2 layer cake) and then sprinkle the nuts on top to decorate

I will post a photo of the finished product when I can get hold of one!