A guaranteed crowd-pleaser, our sumptuous cake ticks all the right boxes: lusciously soft sponge, crunchy nuts, spicy ginger and a zesty, divinely indulgent frosting…
Allow plenty of time for this carrot cake recipe to cool before icing.
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Yields:
12 serving(s)
Prep Time:
30 mins
Cook Time:
30 mins
Total Time:
1 hr 45 mins
Cal/Serv:
697
Ingredients
225ml
(8fl oz) sunflower oil, plus extra to grease
225g
(8oz) light muscovado sugar
4
medium eggs
225g
(8oz) self-raising flour
1tsp.
bicarbonate of soda
1½tsp each mixed spice and ground cinnamon
1
orange
150g
(5oz) sultanas
200g
(7oz) carrots, coarsely grated
50g
(2oz) each walnuts and stem ginger
For the frosting
600g
(1lb 5oz) cream cheese
200g
(7oz) icing sugar, sifted
Finely grated zest of 1 orange
Directions
Step 1
Preheat oven to 170°C (150°C fan) mark 3. Grease and line base and sides of a 20.5cm (8in) cake tin with parchment paper. Whisk oil, sugar and eggs in a large bowl until smooth. Stir in flour, soda and spices. Finely grate zest of orange and add to mixture with juice from only half the orange. Add sultanas, carrots, walnuts and ginger and mix well.
Step 2
Spoon mixture into prepared tin and bake for 30min. Cover cake with foil and bake for a further 1hr 15min, or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave to cool for 5min in tin, then remove and cool on a wire rack.
Step 3
To make frosting, mix all the ingredients together in a bowl. Cut cooled cake in
two and use half the frosting to sandwich together. Spread remaining frosting over top and decorate with marzipan carrots.
Step 4
To make marzipan carrots:
Colour 75g (3oz) marzipan with orange food colouring and 15g (½oz) marzipan with green food colouring. Divide orange marzipan into 12; shape into cones. Mark ridges with a cocktail stick. Divide green marzipan into 12; shape into fronds and stick on to carrots.
Step 5
To store: The iced cake, without marzipan carrots, will keep in the fridge for up to 5 days.
An experienced and highly skilled team of food writers, stylists and digital content producers, the Good Housekeeping Cookery Team is a close-knit squad of food obsessives. Cookery Editor Emma Franklin is our resident chilli obsessive and barbecue expert, who spends an inordinate amount of time on holidays poking round the local supermarkets seeking out new and exciting foods. Senior Cookery Writer Alice Shields is a former pastry chef and baking fanatic who loves making bread and would have peanut butter with everything if she could. Her favourite carb is pasta, and our vibrant green spaghetti is her weeknight go-to. Lover of all things savoury, Senior Cookery Writer Grace Evans can be found eating crispy corn and nocellara olives at every opportunity, and will take the cheeseboard over dessert any time (though she cannot resist a slice of tres leches cake). With a wealth of professional kitchen know-how, culinary training and years of experience between them, they are all dedicated to ensuring every Good Housekeeping recipe is the best it can be, so you can trust they’ll work (and if they don’t – we’ll have the answer for why*) every time (*90% of the time the answer is: “buy an separate oven thermometer”!).
