It's the first time I've done a carrot cake in my life and it couldn't have been more
delicious. I was worried that it will have a deep carrot taste, but it's far from it. The
flavour is well balanced, it's a moist and absolutely delicious cake, not too sweet and the
cream cheese frosting is just perfect for the balance.
Homemade Moist Carrot Cake
INGREDIENTS:
300 g dark brown soft sugar
4 medium eggs
300 ml oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
300 g self-raising flour
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1 large orange zest
200 g carrots
125 g walnuts
Cream cheese frosting:
150 g butter
150 g full fat cream cheese ( use cold, straight from fridge )
300g icing sugar
DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 170 degrees C.
Lightly grease 2 round cake tins with butter and line the base with greaseproof paper.
In a large mixing bowl, beat the wet ingredients together: sugar, eggs, oil and vanilla
extract. Set the bowl aside.
In a separate bowl, stir the dry ingredients together: flour, cinnamon, nutmeg and orange
zest.
Pour the mixed wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix together until well
combined.
Add the grated carrot and chopped walnuts ( I used mixed nuts: walnuts, almonds and hazelnuts )
and fold into the mixture.
Divide the mixture evenly between the 2 cake tins and bake for 30-35 minutes, until risen,
golden on top and a toothpick inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean. I had to
keep mine for around 50 minutes in the oven, but it largely depends on your oven.
Leave to cool for 20 minutes in the baking tins, then transfer onto a wire rack and leave
to cool completely.
Cream cheese frosting:
Beat the butter until is really soft, fluffy and pale in colour.
Add in half of the icing sugar ( I used icing sugar mixed with vanilla icing sugar ) and beat
until smooth.
Add in the rest of the icing sugar and beat again until smooth and creamy.
Take the cream cheese out of the fridge and add it in. Fold the cream cheese into the
frosting until smooth and well combined. Make sure you don't overdo it, as it can become
runny quite quickly.
Start assembling the cake. If the cake is doomed on top and you don't want it like that, you
can cut the extra sponge, to level it. On the first layer of the cake, spread half of the
cream cheese frosting, then add the 2nd layer on. Press down gently and on the 2nd layer add
the remaining cream cheese frosting.
You can decorate with either walnuts or lemon slices or both, as I did.
Store the cake in a covered container, to make sure it doesn't dry up, it keeps for around 3 days in
the fridge.
TIP: It works really well if you squeeze lemon juice on the cake as you are eating it. It gives
it a bit of a zing and kick.
0 Comments