Carrot Cake with Fig Jam

Spicer College in Kirkee, run by the Seventh Day Adventists, has always had a food department . They teach their students food technology and catering and produce a crunchy peanut butter, soya milk, a muesli, frozen corn plus several goodies from their bakery section among which are lamington cake, doughnuts, date cake, brownies and carrot cake. In twenty years they have not varied their products and they are uniformly good, produced in small quantities and always sold out by the end of the day.
Since they are so reasonably priced with no frills whatsoever I always pick up something if I am passing by one of their outlets. (There is one in the Wonderland shopping arcade on Main Street).

My own carrot cake recipe adapted from one in "The Joy of Cooking" is a trifle better and I wanted to bake it again when I got hold of some organic khandsari (raw cane) sugar recently. It is made with oil and might be a bit healthier with the addition of the cane sugar instead of white sugar.

Ingredients

1 cup sifted flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsps baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon powder

2/3 cup sunflower oil
1 cup raw cane sugar
2 eggs

1 1/2 cups grated carrot (about 8 small ones)
1/4 cup walnuts and almond bits or any other nuts

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Oil 2 5" round cake tins and set aside. Grate the carrots, chop the nuts. In a mixing bowl sift all the dry ingredients together. In a seperate bowl pour in the oil, add the sugar and mix well. Beat the eggs and add to the oil and sugar mixture.When well mixed add the dry ingredients and stir with a wooden spoon, breaking up any lumps till completely incorporated into the oil mixture. Last of all stir in the walnuts and grated carrot and divide the mixture equally between the two prepared cake tins.
Bake in a hot oven for 20-25 minutes till done. Remove and cool on a wire rack. When cooled spread fig and walnut jam on the top of one cake and sandwich with the other. Decorate with slivers of carrot.

"The Joy of Cooking"
Irma Rombauer & Marion Rombauer Becker