Breda’s Carrot Cake

I have been hearing, for the longest time, that Fergal’s work colleague Breda (a local celebrity no less ) “makes a great carrot cake”.

I wasn’t too sure if this was a hint or whether just a statement of interest… Until I was presented the written recipe, thanks to lovely Breda, and realised that yes, it was a hint indeed.

I went through a phase of making carrot cake a couple of years ago, and as all things go through phases, cakes do so too. I’m slightly mortified to mention at this point that carrot cake is Fergal’s favourite cake (yes, that is Fergal, my sweet beloved husband who eats vegetables only under duress or when they are heavily disguised as meat-like pieces)

 Reason enough!

So this is the delicious carrot cake recipe; as usual I made my own adjustments here and there as I am a meddler and am incapable of leaving a recipe alone.

(I was given the recipe in ounces, but my scales is in grams, so I converted the quantities, hence some of the mad looking amounts, like 205g!!)

Breda’s Carrot Cake

 (I used two 2lb loaf tins, lined with parchment)

 Preheat the oven to 160′C. 

 12oz/ 350g Self Raising Flour

7 oz / 205g Brown  Sugar

4 Eggs

6oz/180g Sultanas

7oz/205g Grated Carrot

2 Grated Orange Rind (keep some for the topping)

7 fl. oz / 185 ml Sunflower Oil

2 teaspoons Baking Powder

1 teaspoon Cinnamon

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (bread soda)

1/2 teaspoon Nutmeg

Orange juice: I used the juice from the grated oranges in the mixture

 How-To:

Mix sugar, sultanas, carrots, orange rind and juice into a large bowl.

 Beat the eggs and oil together and stir into the carrot mix.

 Sieve flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, bread soda, salt and baking powder and add to wet mixture.

Pour into the prepared tin and cook for 1 1/4- 1 1/2 hours and a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.

Once cooled, make the frosting topping:

8 oz/ 250g sugar

8 oz/ 250g butter

1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence

250g of Philadelphia

125g of Marscapone

Orange rind

Whip it all up with your beater or a strong arm, spread lavishly on the top of the cakes and eat the remainder out the bowl with your fingers.

 Thank you Breda