Wendy Wilson's banana, carrot and nut cake

 And so yesterday you met the Kitchen Crusader. She will be guest blogging here from time to time. I hope that you will feel encouraged to swing by her blog and try some of her recipes. She is a far more creative cook than I am! She also (and this is important) eats tomatoes. I don't, so without her input, there would be a paucity of tomato recipes on this blog. Not that she will be sharing only tomato recipes here, I hasten to add. Next week's recipe is something completely different, and one I can't wait to try myself!

Banana, carrot and nut cake

This recipe came from about the same period as the banana loaf recipe, but it comes from a different Wendy. I gather that she is no longer a Wilson, but she was when she gave me the recipe, so we'll stick with that. Wendy' speciality was cakes. She baked magnificent cakes and generously shared her recipes with all comers. I am about to share one of them with you. Apologies for the 'hotspot' in the photo - my photography skills need work (I also need a better camera, but hey ho).

Ingredients

250ml sugar
250ml oil
3 eggs
375ml plain (cake) flour
7.5ml baking powder
7.5ml bicarbonate of soda
10ml ground cinnamon
250ml grated carrot (about one 5"/12cm carrot)
250ml mashed banana (about 3 smallish bananas)
250ml chopped nuts

Icing:
375ml icing sugar
15ml butter
15ml cream cheese
Plain yoghurt
Little lemon juice

Method

• Cream sugar, oil and eggs well.
• Sift flour, baking powder, bicarb and cinnamon together and add to the creamed mixture.
• Add remaining ingredients. Blend well together.
• Pour into a deep cake pan and bake at 160C for about an hour. Check from time to time with a skewer.
• Allow to cool on a rack. Don't ice it until it has cooled down completely.

Icing:

The icing should gently run over the edge

• Mix a little icing sugar with the butter and cream cheese until creamed.
• Alternate adding more icing sugar and yoghurt and a few drops of lemon juice until the mixture is just stiff enough to run over the edge of the cake when poured on top.
• Pour gently and slowly onto top centre of the cake.