The humble carrot cake

Ahh carrot cake. How I love thee, not only for your tastiness but also your veggie-smuggling ability in getting the bigger lad to eat some goodness. Even if that goodness is covered with cake and icing. It makes me feel better and that's good enough for me. 
I have a fairly big range of cookbooks, which I adore and quite often just read for fun (I know, sorry to rub my crazy party life in your face but there you have it). This recipe comes from one of my all time favs and most often used - the Big Bertha of The Everyday Baker cookbook shelf, Stephanie Alexander's The Cook's Companion. In my opinion everyone should own a copy of The Cook's Companion. It's just that good. The cake recipe is from Stephanie, while the icing is my own variation and together they are just scrumptious.

Simple Carrot Cake

Ingredients
125g self raising flour
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2/3 cup olive oil
2 eggs, lightly beaten
2 cups grated carrot
60g chopped walnuts

Method
Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsuis and grease an 18cm tin.
Mix flour, sugar and spices. Add oil and eggs, mixing until just combined.
Stir in carrot and walnuts. Spoon into prepared tin and bake for 40-60 minutes.

Creamy Lemon Vanilla Icing
60g cream cheese
120g icing sugar
30g softened butter
Juice of half a lemon
1/2 teaspoon vanilla bean paste

Whisk until smooth, or blitz in a food processor if you have one.
When cake is cooled, spread icing over.