Wednesday 6 July 2011

Carrot cake with cream cheese frosting : irresistible! (EN)


And this is why I've gained 3 kilos in 3 weeks when I first arrived in Australia. How to resist those fluffy carrot cakes in the numerous bakeries and coffee shops of every streets in Sydney? Fortunately, I now live far away from this temptation. Which means I have to deal now with chocolate croissant and fondant au chocolat instead... Will it ever stop?

I've heard the carrot cake's call again recently and here I am, trying to find the best recipe on the internet. The first time I've tried to make one was some months ago for my new-zelander flatmate's birthday. "It's like if home was brought to me for this special day". humm that was enough to encourage me to make it again. Today, I will try to be patient and wait until the day after to bring it to the office as promised. And this is why I like the idea of a cream cheese frosting, it just perfectly covers any hole I could leave if I end up crunching some chunk in the cake. Ok... I am just kidding!


Ingredients for 8/10 portions

Cake
200g brown sugar
20 cl vegetable oil
4 eggs
A pinch of salt
1 teaspoon of baking powder
250g of flour
5 large grated carrots
120g walnuts, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon crushed ginger
One generous pinch of nutmeg

Cream cheese frosting
200g cream cheese
50g icing sugar
zest of one orange

Preheat the oven to 180°.

Whisk the flour, baking powder, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger salt together in a mixing bowl. Using a separate bowl, whisk the eggs and oil. Add to the dry ingredients. Beat on low for a minute. Add in the grated carrots. Stir until just mixed.

Pour the batter into the oiled cake pans. Bake about 40 minutes. The sides of the cake should be coming away from the sides of the cake tin and a skewer inserted into the center of the cake should come out clean. If the cake looks quite done on the outside but is still dribbly in the middle, turn the oven heat down a bit, and leave it for another twenty minutes. It should then cook more slowly but more evenly throughout.

When cooked, let the cake cooling down on a wire rack. Save in the fridge as long as you can wait ( if you manage to wait for 24h, you're a star and then spices will be perfectly revealed).

Just before serving, beat the cream cheese and the zest on medium speed until well combined. Sift in the icing sugar. Sandwich the cake layers together with 1/3 of the frosting. Spread frosting over the top of the cooled cake.

My tip: For a better display, I encourage you to use a round mould (the one I used wasn't really appropriate as you can see on the picture below which doesn't really make justice to the cake).



3 comments:

Kim said...

Where is the time that we would eat those in little cafes in Sydney..!

Yolaine said...

Hey mais je croyais que tu devais nous le faire goûter??

GleN said...

MiAm mIaM

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