Last year I set myself the task of finding the ultimate carrot cake - and I am very pleased to report that I have now found it. The cake that inspired me to find a new recipe was from the Cottonrake Bakery in Glasgow which - in my opinion - has the best carrot cake ever. It's dark brown in colour - which gives it almost a caramel quality to it, contains walnuts (always a plus), its never too dry, and the cream cheese icing isn't overly sweet and has a slight tang to it. Eating it transformed carrot cake for me and turned it into one of my favourite types of cake. In fact, I received an entire one for my 21st birthday earlier in the year and I'm (almost) embarrassed at the amount of it I ate by myself... It really is fantastic and if you're ever in Glasgow then I insist that you go and try for yourself. This recipe however is the closest thing that I've found to Cottonrake's.
I have to say, I felt very proud when I served this cake to my family - it was exactly what I wanted it to be and it has now become my staple carrot cake. It also got rave reviews from my family - in particular my mum who said it was best carrot cake she'd ever had (I know she's my mum and so she may be a tad biased BUT she's also very honest so theres that!). So I hope this works for you, because I am over the moon that I came across this recipe.
My version of the recipe is adapted from The Brick Kitchen's Favourite Carrot Cake - I am very grateful that you posted this.
INGREDIENTS
For the cake:
200g plain flour
1 ½ teaspoons bicarbonate of soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon mixed spice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 eggs
170g caster sugar
170g dark brown sugar
275ml vegetable oil
150g grated carrot
100g walnuts, roughly chopped
70g crushed pineapple (weight after remaining liquid removed)
For the icing:
125g cream cheese
125g mascarpone
35g icing sugar
zest of 1 orange
DIRECTIONS
Cake
1. Preheat oven to 170°C/150°C fan and line a cake tin.
2.Sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and spices.
3. Add the remaining ingredients and mix for one minute on a slow speed, scrape the sides and then mix for a further 3 minutes. (I used a standing mixer for this, so you may want to mix for longer if you're using a handheld mixer. Just make sure that it's all well incorporated.)
4. Pour into the lined tin and bake for 1 hour and a half.
Finish
5. Allow the cake to cool - this will take a while as it is a big cake, I would allow 2 hours or so. When I did it I was very impatient and put it in the fridge, then iced it when it was still slightly warm BUT it tasted good anyway.
6. For the icing - simply whisk all of the ingredients together until you have a smooth icing. I think it's sweet enough, but feel free to add more sugar if you think it needs it, it will only make it slightly thicker.
7. To ice, I just add the icing to the top, smooth it out and dust on some cinnamon to serve.
I hope you enjoy, let me know if you do.
Zoe
ps. apologies for the bad iPhone photos - but needs must!
