A Carrot Cake...for metric fans

What a start to October - after September's abominable baking record (mitigating circumstances aside) it's good to be whisking and folding again. The first day of this new month was inaugurated with a carrot cake, but not a mundane carrot cake - this is a recipe my Mother gave me. Which she was given at a supermarket promotion. For Philadelphia cream cheese. So we call this Philadelphia carrot cake! I promise there's no link with the makers of this most processed of cream cheese, but the weird thing is this: the icing never quite tastes the same with ersatz cream cheese (think fromage frais, quark or even the perennially fashionable creme fraiche) - the texture and flavour are best when made with this old American favourite...but it was given to my Mother while we lived in Norway, and here's the catch: all the ingredients are measured in decilitres, not the more common grams. So get a measuring jug out and make this cake - it's lighter and less stringy than traditional carrot cakes, with a good hit of cinnamon and lots of yummy carrot.

Ingredients:

Cake

• 5 dl self-raising flour 
• 3 dl caster sugar
• 1 dl melted butter
• 4 eggs
• 6 dl grated carrot
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp salt
• you can also add raisins/walnuts, but I didn't.

Icing:

• Philadelphia cream cheese (no cheating with the low-fat version!!)
• 125g softened butter
• a small handful of icing sugar (do this according to taste, I don't like it too sweet)
• generous splash of vanilla extract - but not the whole bottle

First, lightly oil a long, rectangular baking pan. Preheat oven to 180ºC

In a large bowl, whisk the eggs and sugar until light and mousse-like (ca. 8-10 mins)

In a separate bowl, sieve all your dry ingredients except the grated carrot. 

When the eggs are light and fluffy, add your flour, give it a few folds with a large metal spoon, then add the carrot and butter. Fold through with the spoon, careful not to overdo it though as this will knock all the air out...

Once the mix looks even, plop it in the baking pan and place on the middle shelf of the oven for 35-40 minutes. 

The icing? Easy - just place the butter in a mixing bowl, whisk up so it looks soft and creamy, then add your cream cheese in 3-4 increments. Finally add the sugar and vanilla and whisk again...this can also be used on other cakes such as banana cake or (controversially) chocolate cake. I reckon carrot cake is still king...

In praise of passionfruit...

Admittedly not a classic Scandinavian ingredient but passionfruit always reminds me of this heavenly tropical soda my Dad brought back from Sweden when I was younger. Amazing stuff, the Swedes do know something about making soda, although it's probably contraband (Norwegians don't like a lot of imports from abroad, even if it's their next-door neighbour). If I tasted this tropical lusciousness now I might be less enamoured by its walloping sacharineness, not to mention the plethora of 'E' numbers and preservatives. At any rate, the smell and taste of 

passionfruit pulp is an absolute joy and I don't bake nearly enough with this curious, wrinkly fruit. So, on the eve of my flatmate Sophie's birthday out came the baking bibles and I scoured through to find something worthy of her impending celebrations, et voila! a lovely citrussy sponge adapted from the Leiths Baking Bible with a passionfruit cream cheese icing. I added some ground almonds to the sponge for a bit of texture and moistness, and also chucked in frozen blueberries to the mix which went well with the lime zest, but was somewhat over

whelmed by the exquisite passionfruit icing. Whatever, it was still sheer passionfruit bliss, eat it and weep.

Cake Ingredients

• 150g softened butter
• 150g caster sugar
• grated zest of 1 lime
• 3 medium eggs
• 130g self-raising flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 70g ground almonds
• pinch salt
• 150g frozen blueberries (optional) or raspberries 

Icing Ingredients

• 150g Philadelphia Cream Cheese - no cheating, it has to be the full-fat variety
• 100g softened butter
• 60g icing sugar (this can be varied by 15g, depending on the tartness of the passionfruit)
• 2 passionfruit - 1 for the icing, 1 for decorating
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 190ºC. Lightly oil a round 20cm cake tin and set aside.

In a medium bowl, cream the softened butter with an electric mixer, then add the sugar, beat again until pale and fluffy before adding the lime zest. Add the eggs individually, beating with the mixer after each addition, and then finally add the ground almonds, and flour, folding through 6-8 times with a large metal spoon. Add your blueberries or raspberries at this stage and give the mix a few more folds with the spoon before turning out into the cake tin.

Bake on the central shelf in the oven for 45 minutes. This is quite a moist cake so it will take a little longer to bake through, if it starts to scorch, turn the heat down to 170ºC.

When the cake is baked, allow to cool completely before preparing the icing: using an electric whisk, soften the Philadelphia for a minute, then add the soft butter and mix thoroughly. Add your vanilla extract and icing sugar, and finally take the pulp of 1 passionfruit, including the spawn-like seeds, and fold this in to the icing with as spoon. Using a spatula, smooth the icing over the now-cooled cake and then using a teaspoon place dollops of passionfruit pulp & seeds all over the icing to create a polka dot effect! As it's rather warm and sultry in London I would advise keeping the cake in your fridge to prevent the icing from going rancid, it keeps rather well for a day or two...