Sweet Root

An old favourite jazzed up for a sunny, sunny Sunday. A zesty, zingy carrot cake with lime frosting. Because the cake uses oil as the fat component, it's faster to prepare than other butter-based cakes, and stays nice and moist. The recipe was adapted from a Nigel Slater one from the Observer, which I bookmarked some time ago. I disagree with his stinginess on the carrot front though. I upped the dose, and after the taste test found that I could have been even more generous.

The carrot cake fiesta over the weekend (it really was - there was tons of the stuff, and I still have a cupful of lime frosting in the fridge that I must find a use for) got me thinking about other sweet things with vegetable components. In Japan I used to regularly find pumpkin-flavoured desserts in the supermarket or convenience stores, like purin (custard pudding) - which I'd love to have a go at - cakes and muffins. Over here it's a bit harder to find the small, squat, super-sweet pumpkins with the knobbly green skin they use, but I think butternut squash would be an equally good substitute.


The Japanese also make innovative use of sweet potatoes, which come in a variety of colours ranging from white to purple. Traditional sweet potato treats can be a bit cloying and floury, but I discovered a more modern and infinitely posher dessert, of the kind sold in high-end food halls and the gift arcades of airports, whose lip-licking memory still haunts my dreams... it's called 'Lovely' and made by a Kagoshima-based company called Festivalo. Horrid names (note to self, the bizarre vocabulary of Japanese food marketers deserves a whole post in the near future) but the product is truly delicious! It's basically sweet potato blended with cream and sugar and gently baked, giving it a soft, dense, almost cheesecakey texture.

In case you were wondering, here's what they look like:


Little parcels of...er... Loveliness! I can't wait to eat some of these babies when I go back to Japan in a month...

Well, I can't give you Lovelies, I'm afraid, but I can divulge the carrot-lime cake recipe in their stead - I think it's an adequate replacement.

Carrot Cake with Lime Frosting after Nigel Slater
makes one round 20cm cake and one small loaf cake, or equivalent(?!)

250g self-raising flour
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
pinch of salt
200g flavourless oil such as sunflower or rapeseed
230g caster or soft brown sugar
200g carrots (peeled weight)
juice of 1 lime

Frosting
200g full fat cream cheese
200g unsalted butter at room temperature
100g icing sugar
zest and juice of 1 lime

Sift all the dry cake ingredients into a large bowl.

Grate the carrots and stir into the dry ingredients.

In a separate bowl whisk the sugar and oil together, then add the eggs one by one, until well combined. (I did this the wrong way round - eggs in first and oil after - and the mixture went a bit lumpy, but the cake was still fine.)

Pour the oil and sugar mixture into the dry ingredients and mix well; don't be alarmed if it looks very thick and unmanageable, just pour in the lime juice and you'll see it loosens considerably.

Pour into your cake tins of choice, greased and with the bottom lined, and bake at 180 C for 30 -40 minutes. (Less for a small round cake and more for a loaf).

Whilst it's baking, prepare the frosting by first whisking the butter and sugar with an electric beater until fluffy, then adding the cream cheese a little at a time. Finally, add the lime zest, and the lime juice very gradually.

Ice the cakes once they've cooled completely.