Carrot, Date, Coconut and Hazelnut Cake With Orange Blossom Cream Cheese Icing

In the weekend i really wanted to do some baking, preferably a cake, but unfortunatly we were out of butter. Sooooo, I had to make a cake with no butter, which was actually quite easy to find as a lot of cakes, like carrot, are made with oil instead of butter which actually gives a moister cake. You can play around with the types of dried fruits and nuts used in this recipe and could even add different spices to suit your liking. 

Carrot, Date, Coconut and Hazelnut Cake With Orange Blossom Cream Cheese Icing

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

pinch of salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 large eggs

1 cup sugar

3/4 vegetable oil

8 ounces peeled and finely grated carrots

1/2 cup chopped medjool dates

1/2 cup chooped hazelnuts

1/2 cup dessicated coconut

Preheat the oven at 180 degrees C

grease and line a 20cm cake tin. 

Sift together flour, cinnamon, salt, baking powder and baking soda and put on one side.

In another bowl, Beat together eggs and sugar until pale and fluffy. Slowly drizzle in the oil and continue to beat for another minutes until all combined. Add the dry ingredients in 3 additions. 

Add the hazelnuts, carrots, coconut and dates. Mix it with a spatula.

Pour the mixture into the tin and bake it for 40-45 minutes until golden and a skewer inserted comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely. 

Orange Blossom Cream Cheese Icing

200g cream cheese

1 teaspoon of orange blossom water

zest of half an orange

50g icing sugar, sifted

Beat all the ingredients together until smooth. Spread over the top of the cooled cake and decorate with toppings of your choice (I used almonds, coconut flakes, sliced dates and edible flowers)