Dr. Rita Hand's Carrot Cake

Ok Strawberry, I am super impressed by the blog so here is my first contribution under my alias, Dr. Rita Hand.  I made this cake for a cake sale in work and made the mistake of mentioning it to the girls and of course, I was volunteered for dessert duty the following Tuesday.

Ingredients

For the cake:

2 eggs

150ml vegetable oil (I used sunflower oil)

200g white sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

125g plain flour

1 teaspoon bread soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

2 large carrots grated

65g pecans (chopped, or pulverised in the liquidiser; whichever your preference)

For the icing:

65g butter

110g cream cheese (I used low fat and it worked perfectly)

240g icing sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence

Preheat the oven to 170 degrees celsius. 



 Into a large bowl, place the eggs, white sugar and vanilla essence.

Beat this mixture together with a fork.

Sieve the flour into the mixture.

Add the ground cinnamon.

Using a fork, mix until you achieve a smooth consistency.

Add the grated carrots.

Pop the pecans into the liquidiser and turn on for a few seconds.

Stir the grated carrots and ground pecans through the mixture.

Grease a loaf tin with a little butter and dust with a little flour.  Pour the mixture into the loaf tin. 

Bake in the oven for approximately 45-50 minutes (for a fan-assisted oven).  Stick a skewer into cake and if it is clean when removed then the cake is ready!  Leave to cool before trying to remove from the cake tin. 

For the icing, use soft butter and chop into small pieces.  Add to liquidiser or bowl if you have a hand mixer (my kitchen equipment is limited).  The liquidiser is from Aldi- thanks Mum!  Sieve in the icing sugar and add the cream cheese and vanilla essence.  Pop the lid on and turn the liquidiser on full blast until you achieve a nice, smooth consistency.  You may need to stop for a few seconds and mix with a spoon to ensure no pockets of icing sugar are forming.  You may find it necessary to taste it at this point.  You may also find that plenty of willing volunteers will suddenly materialise to "help".

Pour the icing over the cake.  Even with a generous layer, there will be plenty left over.  This icing is also really good for cupcakes.

Top with a pecan or two to make it look pretty.