Carrot Cake

First time that I tried making carrot cake! After looking through a few recipes, I chose this one since the others had pineapple and coconut in them among other ingredients.

Ingredients:

1 cup self raising flour

1 cup plain flour

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

1 cup oil

1 cup soft brown sugar

4 eggs

1/2 golden syrup

2 and a 1/2 cups grated carrot

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

-Icing:

175g softened cream cheese

60g softened butter

185g icing sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

1-2 teaspoons lemon juice.

Procedure:

Preheat oven to 160C. Lightly grease a 23cm/9inch round cake tin and line base and side with baking paper. Sift flours, spices, and soda into large bowl and make a well in the centre.

Whisk together oil, sugar, eggs, and golden syrup in a jug until combined. Add this mixture to the well in the flour and gradually stir into the dry ingredients with a metal spoon until smooth. Stir in the carrot and nuts, then spoon into the tin and smooth the surface. Bake for 1 hour and 30 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean when inserted into the centre of the cake.

Leave the cake in the tin for at least 15 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

For the lemon icing, beat the cream cheese and butter with electric beaters until smooth. Gradually add the icing sugar alternately with the vanilla and lemon juice, beating until light and creamy. Spread the icing over the cooled cake using a flatbladed knife.